Published by Ink Raven Press

Copyright © 2016 Beverley Lee

All rights reserved.

ISBN-13 978-0-9935490-0-7

ISBN-10 0-9935490-0-7

DEDICATION

For Joshua and Violet, with love.

Always follow your dreams.

Part 1

Chapter One

She dreamed in grey, the colour of misery.

The pall bearers lowered her coffin into the ground. She banged on the lid, bloody fingers clawing at the wood. But she wasn’t trying to get out. She was trying to get in.

Beth Davenport stared at the ceiling, the dream hovering at the edge of her consciousness. A thin light filtered in through the small gap between the bedroom curtains. It had meanness to it, an après holiday middle finger salute by a callous bully.

Stu lay beside her, seemingly oblivious to anything strange. The dream hung in her mind, stuck there as if her sleep-fogged brain had pressed pause. She wouldn’t sleep now, she knew it. Time to fix the first tea of the day before Gabriel woke and demanded her attention. Her beautiful baby boy. In six short and sleep-deprived months, he had filled a place inside her that she never knew existed.

The floorboards were cool under her bare feet as she slid out of bed, the dawn light now apologetic in its colour. She grabbed a sweatshirt from the wicker chair by the window, shrugging herself into it as she padded past Gabriel’s room. She smiled at the silence. He had cried nearly all the way home in the car last night, which was strange, as the movement normally lulled him to sleep.

Downstairs, the silence hammered against her ears—and there was something else. A knot of unease tightened in her stomach and she shivered, despite the sweatshirt.

She went about her morning routine. Kettle. Water. Tea bag. Habit forced her hand to open the cupboard door under the sink, where the dog biscuits were. She paused, glancing to the window. An image of the goofy Labrador chasing his tail on the lawn flashed into her mind. But Jake was gone. Taken too soon. An inoperable tumour, the vet had said. Maybe she should talk to Stu about getting a puppy?

Steam drifted across her line of vision. She readied herself to pour a much needed caffeine fix but stopped dead. A small beetle scuttled across the kitchen counter and disappeared between a gap in the tiles. The knot uncurled itself and slithered around her gut. Her heartbeat thudded against her ears. Had she imagined it?

There had to be a logical reason for this. The common sense part of her brain demanded some attention. She must be getting sick. That would be typical right after the holiday, with Stu working long hours and Gabriel’s two new teeth coming through.

Beth grasped the side of the farmhouse sink. Shutting her eyes didn’t sound like a very good idea but she did it anyway, willing some sturdy governess to wander in and save her sanity.

Only her reflection stared back from the window when she opened her eyes, showing a woman with dark hair gathered into a rough top knot. A woman with the beginning of frown lines and yesterday’s mascara smudged under one eye. It also showed her mother as she remembered her as a child. She gasped, an ‘oh’ of surprise exhaled in the next breath. A lump swelled in her throat and she fought back the urge to cry. Already she recognized it as one of those life-defining moments that jabbed you in the ribs—youth taking a backwards step while life becomes, somehow, shorter. She knew all the ins and outs, had written about it at length (flippantly) in her magazine column last year. Life doesn’t end when you hit your thirties, but it certainly quickens its step.

She wanted Stu’s arms around her, or the sweet, early morning smell of her son. This must be the after-holiday doldrums or some kind of bug; she would feel much better after a cuddle and maybe a long, hot shower if Gabriel played nicely.

A patch of sunlight thrust a golden glow on the wooden handrail of the staircase. She let her hand run through the comforting light. Her mind raced ahead, wondering if sliding into bed beside Stu and waking him in the nicest possible way was an option. She grinned.

The staircase led to a long hallway with uneven whitewashed walls she desperately wanted to change. But they had only lived here for six months before their short holiday and they’d spend those six months in a whirlwind of unpacking and exploring, baby milestones and sleep-deprived routine. When Gabriel arrived, they both wanted him to grow up somewhere with space, so they sold their little brick box at the edge of suburbia and moved across two counties to this old farmhouse the estate agents lovingly called ‘a forever home’. They must have told the mice too, as three days after dropping anchor, they’d had to call in pest control.

Four doors led off from the hallway. Their bedroom, which was to the right and next to the bathroom. Gabriel’s room next to theirs and a final door at the end, which they planned to turn into their study/sewingroom/playroom/sleepover den. Right now, it was their drop-anything-and-run room, which held a rickety spare bed and minimal storage.

She paused at the top of the stairs, trying to ignore the fact that the spare room door stood open a little. They always made a point of closing it because she hated all of the clutter. And if it stayed shut, she could pretend the mess didn’t exist.

The feeling that everything was out of kilter ran down her spine like iced water. If this was a dream, she wanted to wake up now.

But all she had to do was walk up to the door, grasp hold of the handle, and close it. She could do this. The no-nonsense side of Beth Davenport, aged thirty-three, wife, mother, journalist, and all-time best Scrabble player nudged her into action.

A cool draught crept around her bare feet and laced its icy fingers around her ankles. She approached the door as if it might bite back, reaching for the handle with an outstretched arm. Her hands shook.

Through the few inches of space, she could see their suitcases stacked by the bed. Stu must have brought them in as she’d settled Gabriel. Two cases—one large, one small—even though they had only been gone a week. Sitting on top of the smallest suitcase was a box. A box they had bought in the antique shop on the high street in Oakenshaw. What a bargain, Stu had whispered to her as the man behind the desk slid it across the counter. She remembered he had thrust his hand into a white cotton glove beforehand, as though he hadn’t wanted to touch it.

It was the simple gesture of a careful shop owner, she had reasoned. ‘Preserve the precious’. A ridiculous image took root in her mind. A Gollum character, complete with white gloves.

She needed strong coffee. And quite possibly a good talking to.

***

An hour later and the contents of a jug of coffee drunk, Beth’s earlier jumpy mood seemed like the obvious aftermath of an unsettled night—and a far too acute imagination. Stu was changing Gabriel upstairs and she smiled. He wasn’t typically home until long after Gabriel had gone to bed, so he insisted on doing the early morning routine. She loved him all the more for it.

The familiar jarring tone of Stu’s Blackberry buzzed, interrupting Gabriel’s giggling.

A few minutes later, he appeared in the doorway with Gabriel in his arms. Her son gurgled in excitement as she held out her arms. She tickled his cheek and he burst into a toothless grin.

‘Hey, gorgeous. Did you tell daddy what fun you’re going to have today?’

‘Sorry, Beth. I’m going to have to go in. It was Dan—that big prospective client I told you about. He’ll only speak to me.’

She knew he was genuinely sorry, but she couldn’t stop the disappointment showing in her face. ‘Can’t you do it on Skype? I’d hoped we could get one more day before you had to jump back into the lion pit.’

Stu sighed. ‘You know I would if it was possible. But there’s a snow storm coming through later, and our internet connection is crap already. I’ll try and be as quick as I can. Maybe we could go to that new French cafe in Crickley? You can pretend you’re not really sizing it up for next month’s issue.’

He was teasing her, trying to make the best out of a bad situation. And that made her feel worse. She was a breath away from throwing a ridiculous tantrum.

‘Don’t look so sad, darling.’ He slid his arm around her shoulder and for a moment, the comfort of his touch was almost painful. ‘You two have fun. And who knows, if we do get that snow we can build Gabriel’s first snowman.’ He kissed her lightly and Gabriel grabbed hold of his hair. ‘Look after Mummy, big boy,’ he whispered.

The tread of his work shoes sounded on the wooden stairs. Then the creak as the horrendously orange pine wardrobe opened. It had been left by the previous owners, ‘too damn heavy to ask anyone to shift, dearie’.

Part of her wanted to run upstairs and plead with him to stay, but how stupid that sounded to the independent woman inside her. Maybe she was going down with some kind of bug. Gabriel whimpered and she held him close, rubbing his back with her hand. His little mouth gummed down on the edge of her sweatshirt.

She pulled open the fridge door and hooked out his giraffe teething ring. Stu moved about upstairs, the old floorboards groaning, and Gabriel looked up at the noise, his clear blue eyes baby curious.

‘It’s only daddy,’ she said. At once, a thought formed and hovered over her like a thundercloud. Just who else would it be?

Chapter Two

Beth watched until the Range Rover disappeared down the lane. Occasionally she caught glimpses of it through the winter bare hedges as it moved towards the main road, into town. The snow-heavy sky suffocated the morning light. The forecasters might actually have been right for once.

By 11 a.m. Gabriel was tired and grizzly, his mood in tune to the miserable day. He usually didn’t sleep for long, only enough to gain some energy for lunch. She lowered the blind on his window and glanced up at the sky. The first flakes of snow began to fall. They floated down and melted into the ground, the dark, twisted branches of the trees, the old railway sleepers stacked by the apple tree. Beth had hopes to build a vegetable garden in the spring. Suddenly that seemed a long, long way away.

Softly, she crept out of the nursery, the room watched over by orange lions. It was her choice of décor and everything matched: the cot bedding, the changing unit, even the lightshade. Stu had said it reminded him of the Serengeti—that it would make their son want to be a zookeeper. She remembered the night they had finished it, both of them splattered in cream paint, with Gabriel fast asleep in his Moses basket in their bedroom. That had been high summer, as the drone of tractors gathering hay murmured in the distance and the swallows darted in and out of the eaves, busily feeding their growing brood. The house had dozed, warmed by the sun, and sleepy shadows cut across the floors from the odd-shaped roof and internal walls. Everything had been soft and golden and safe.

She shivered as she closed Gabriel’s door. A cold draught licked at her ankles again and she didn’t have to search to know where it had come from. Maybe Stu opened the window before he went off to work. But she couldn’t come up with a reason why. It was mid-January with temperatures hovering barely above freezing, and the house had far too many air gaps and quirky openings.

This was the ideal time to empty the suitcases and sort all the things they had bought on their holiday. The time management part of her brain whirred into action.

She paused outside the door and listened. Silence. She couldn’t even hear the hum of the old back burner that heated the house. She wanted to back away—go watch over Gabriel as he slept. Her fingers closed over the old, iron handle. It was like touching something made of ice. She snatched her hand away as though it had stung her.

‘Get a grip on yourself,’ she whispered.

It took all the resolve she had to close her fingers over that handle again. Slowly, she pulled it down. It was stiff, unyielding, as though it didn’t want her to go inside. She tried to remember if it had always been like that. With her heart hammering in her chest, she flung the door back. It opened easily. She glanced quickly at the window—shut. The draught around her ankles was gone.

Their suitcases and carrier bags lay on the bed, alongside her wool coat and the golfing umbrella Stu had bought in the charity store next to the antique shop. She had laughed at him—he didn’t even play golf—and he tried to look hurt. ‘We’re country folk now. We’d better get with the programme. Next thing will be green...’ And that’s when his eyes had first seen the box, sitting unobtrusively at the rear of the window, hidden from view by an ugly gilt-framed hunting print.

And now here it sat, on top of the smallest case, an ordinary, dirty wooden box with some kind of worn away emblem on the lid. It was about the size of a tissue box, but it might as well have been as large as a blanket chest. She wished she’d voiced how much she’d disliked it before Stu had handed over the money.

She could hide it. The thought slid into her mind as cleanly as a scalpel blade. She chewed the edge of a fingernail. It was the best idea she’d had all day.

Carefully, she edged towards the bed. Dryness coated her tongue, turning it to sandpaper. Her arms were lead weights. She closed her fingers around the box, feeling both sick and shaky. But as she picked it up, it felt like a normal piece of junk. She studied the emblem on the top. Age had faded any detail from the dirt-ingrained wood.

Glancing around the room, she wondered where to stash it. Out of sight, out of mind, right? And Stu was a busy man. He wouldn’t come back into this room, probably for weeks. She scanned the possible hiding places. Under the bed? No, too obvious. The only other piece of furniture was a bookcase left over from her student days, but that wouldn’t hide anything.

Floral curtains hung at the window. They were too narrow; the farmhouse windows were wider than any they’d had before. Like everything else, the curtains were a work in progress. She tucked the box behind the curtain on the left and stood back. They were old, but just thick enough to do the trick.

A murmur sounded from the nursery as Gabriel awoke from his catnap. A lunch demand would follow. With the box hidden and whatever qualms she’d had about it quashed, Beth’s mood was notched up about ten degrees. A weight lifted from around her shoulders. Closing the door behind her, she smiled. Mission accomplished.

Snow fell steadily as she carried a still sleepy Gabriel down the stairs and slid him into the highchair. He rubbed his eyes with both fists, and then let out a plaintive yell.

‘Okay, little man, just hang on a minute.’ She grabbed a jar of baby food from the cupboard and clunked open the lid. ‘Chicken and butternut squash. Yum.’

She sniffed the jar and wrinkled her nose. Why did all baby food smell the same? Sliding open the cutlery drawer, she scooped up his favourite lion head spoon and pulled up a chair.

‘This is when I go into guilt trip mode, baby boy. About how I’m feeding you processed gunk and not a proper, wholesome, home-cooked meal.’

Gabriel grinned and banged the tray noisily. The chicken gloop was a definite hit, probably more so than her homespun attempts. He wolfed down the whole jar in less than five minutes.

Throwing the spoon in the sink, she filled his plastic beaker with water from the filter and handed it to him. He grabbed both handles and, with concentration, brought the spout to his mouth. She rinsed the spoon under the tap. Outside, the sky had taken on a steely colour that meant it was going to throw white stuff down all day. The flakes covered the ground now, with only the tops of the stones and a few sprigs of green poking through. Soon it would be a carpet.

Beth found herself holding her breath and making a wish. It was a childhood habit, along with not standing on the pavement cracks if she really wanted her wish to come true. I wish Stu would come home soon. If it snowed until nightfall, the side roads would be hell, and all it would take would be one car to slide off the road and cause a tail back; even their Range Rover wouldn’t be able to get through at that point.

At least the fridge was fairly full of essentials; they had stopped at the local garage on the way home. She didn’t want to risk going out in her car. Deep down, she knew the accident still played on her mind in bad weather.

The last heavy snow had fallen about three years ago, at the end of March. Everyone thought they had made it through another winter unscathed, so it was a shock to wake up to find everything white over. No one was prepared. She had a meeting in London with her editor and his boss and she didn’t want to reschedule it. She was a careful driver as it was. That day, she drove along the side roads at a near crawl. But just as she hit the main hill, which wound down to the station in a half-moon curve, a car backed out from a hidden driveway in front of her. Instinctively, she stepped down hard on the brake pedal. The car lurched across the ice as it scrabbled for grip, and then, slowly, slid sideways. She shut her eyes, which probably wasn’t the most sensible thing she could have done. After what seemed like forever, the car came to a sudden juddering halt as it hit the side of the stop sign at the end of the road. She was lucky. It had only grazed the pole, the passenger side taking the bulk of the impact. She cut the engine and stared at the steering wheel. Outside, a figure in a khaki green padded jacket and a black beanie hat trudged towards her and tapped on the side window. She’d pressed the button to lower the glass.

‘Are you okay? That was a very elegant slide.’ The driver of the other car had peered in. ‘I’m Stu. What can I do to help?’

***

The box dozed in the grey half-light from the window. An oak tree, branches winter bare and dusted with snow, stood sentinel. Beyond was the ramshackle wooden shed held together by luck, and the cottage garden, its lawn hidden beneath a soft white sheet. In the distance, a huddle of fleece-heavy sheep sheltered by a snowy hedge.

Idyllic. That was the word to describe it. But what use was there for such a word when it could all be swept away? Innocence tasted sweeter when it could be gnawed upon.

For far too long, it had dwelt in the shop window of the antique shop, forgotten and still. But waiting. Waiting for that one person who would catch sight of it, that one person who would admire the seasoned wood and the pure, ageless craftsmanship. It didn’t choose that person; they made that choice on their own. The length of time it took was immaterial, for it had an endless span of minutes. Years. Centuries.

The man had served his purpose. It knew that he would soon forget its existence. He meant to do something with it at some point, but he lacked the resolve and the belief. Now the woman, she was another story. Her instinct was strong. She had sensed the darkness. But she was curious. Afraid. Soon she would return, because she had to. All she had to do was lift the lid.

It would dispose of her in a little while. Once night had fallen. All it wanted was the child.

Chapter Three

Beth awoke with a start. Her phone rang somewhere, its ringtone jarring in the stillness. Her sleep-addled head swam in confusion.

She half ran to the kitchen and grabbed the phone. Stu’s face flashed across the screen as she swiped right.

‘Beth? Hey. I thought it was going to go to voicemail.’ Her husband’s voice faded in and out as he talked.

‘I must have fallen asleep in the chair after lunch. Are you on your way home?’ Hope wavered in her voice as she massaged the back of her stiff neck.

‘I’m sorry, Beth. I’m going to have to stay over down here. Have you not had the news on? The snow’s come down faster than anyone expected and there’s been a pile up on the motorway. Tailbacks are already at five miles.’ In the background, she could hear someone else vying for his attention. She imagined Stu gesturing that he wouldn’t be a minute.

‘I want you to come home.’ A lump wedged itself inside her throat.

‘You’ll be fine, Bethie. Just make sure everything is all locked up. Look, I’ve got to go. Kiss Gabriel for me. I’ll ring later, okay? Love you.’

And with that, he was gone. She listened to the silence for a few seconds then slowly put the phone down on the table. Two fat tears rolled down her cheek and she brushed them away. Angry at them. Angry at life.

Get a fucking grip, will you? The sensible part of her argued that nothing here could hurt her or Gabriel. She had food, she had drink. The worst thing that could happen would be the old back boiler giving up, but they’d had that serviced as soon as they had moved in and the engineer had given it a clean bill of health. ‘This will go on till Doomsday,’ he had laughed, wiping his hands on an oily rag. ‘Built to last, not like the modern stuff.’

Beth glanced at her watch. It was 3 p.m., but already dark was falling, hastened by the steel grey clouds, snow heavy. She glanced out of the window. It was a complete blanket of white. The lavender pots by the edge of the lawn had disappeared, which meant it already had to be over a foot deep. How could snow fall so fast? Nothing moved on the road outside. At this time, it was usually steady with parents picking up from the primary school on Becket Lane. The kids must have been sent home early…whilst she slept?

She filled the kettle and dropped a peppermint tea bag into a mug. Then, she made Gabriel his next bottles. It was time she got her brain into gear. She would play with Gabriel and give him his supper and a bath. Something comforting like cheese on toast for her supper, a nice, hot bath, a glass of red wine, and an early night. A decent night’s sleep would make everything better tomorrow. And then Stu would be home.

It was actually cosy all wrapped up here in her little house with the warm glow of the wood-burning stove, she reasoned to herself. Better than having to try and negotiate public transport on a snow day. Carrying her tea, she tip-toed across to the Silver Cross pram they kept downstairs. Gabriel’s big blue eyes gazed up at her.

‘Hello, little boy. How come you didn’t yell for Mummy?’

His lower lip quivered.

She scooped him up with his blanket and rocked him as she carried him into the kitchen for his bottle. Halfway through, he suddenly stopped and started to cry. She couldn’t remember the last time he had done that. Usually, he drank the whole thing at once, clutching onto the bottle with a mixture of baby instinct and greedy determination.

‘Okay, okay, shush,’ she murmured, placing him over her shoulder with a practised ease. It took a good five minutes of pacing from the kitchen to the living room to settle him. She hoped he wasn’t going down with something, too. She should take his temperature.

The thermometer was still in his changing bag from the holiday and, with Gabriel balanced on her knee, she managed to unzip the bag and search for it. There, in a side pocket. Her fingers closed on the digital stick.

A door slammed upstairs and, in an instant, all of the lights went out.

In the near dark, Beth clutched a grizzling Gabriel to her chest. The thermometer slid onto the wooden floor with a jolting clatter.

Her heart hammered like a caged animal, but she tried hard to keep calm for Gabriel’s sake. Candles. Where did she keep the candles?

The lights flickered twice and then, mercifully, stayed on. Just the effect of too much snow on country wires, that was all. But her heart continued to thud.

The noise of the door slamming had shaken the whole house. She told herself it was only because everything was so quiet and still.

She had two choices. Bundle Gabriel and herself up and try to walk to the nearest house, or be a proper adult and go upstairs to check. The former would require the strength of Thor as the nearest house had to be over half a mile away. They had picked their new home because they wanted peace and no neighbours. Right now, it seemed that idea was the worst they had ever had.

Beth didn’t want to leave Gabriel downstairs (or take him upstairs) but she had little choice. Whispering and clutching him tight, she edged around the living room door and peered up at the stairs. The uninviting gloom beckoned from above. Swallowing hard, she flicked on the landing light. It shone miserably, a single eco-friendly bulb.

She climbed the stairs slowly, holding in her breath at each step, holding her baby tight. She paused at the top, searching for anything unusual. Every single horror movie she had ever seen replayed in her head. This wasn’t a good time to have a vivid imagination.

The doors to their bedroom, the bathroom, and the nursery were all closed. But the door to the spare room stood open. She knew she had shut it earlier.

A shocked cry rose in her throat, a shrill, wavering sound that made Gabriel whimper.

She had to go into that room. Or risk going crazy. She would take the box and throw it outside. She didn’t care if Stu ended up being mad with her. She only wanted it out of the house. It might not be rational, but ever since they had brought it home, strange things had been happening. She hated it with a passion she never knew she had.

Gabriel began to howl. Not a simple sob or cry but a full-scale wail of distress. A wave of guilt flooded her gut.

‘Okay, darling. Mummy’s going to fix this.’ Brave words. But she didn’t feel brave at all as she flicked on the light to the room. Another eco bulb, this time a meagre twenty-five watt. She made a promise to herself that she would change them all the second that she could, saving the planet be damned.

The room was as she had left it. What had she expected? She reached out to touch the curtain and jumped back as Gabriel squirmed in her arms. She had to put him down. Then, she could grab the box, run downstairs, and toss it outside to rot in the snow where it belonged.

Gabriel would object strongly, but she couldn’t risk falling down the stairs with him in her arms. Pushing open the nursery door, she laid him in his cot and twisted the dial on his musical mobile. The animals went in two by two sprang to life. Ignoring her child’s rising, plaintive yell she ran into the spare room and grabbed the box from the windowsill. The feel of it in her hands made her skin crawl.

She half ran, half stumbled down the stairs, terror clenched between her teeth until she reached the entrance hall. The outside door was bolted shut. Tucking the box under one arm, she slid the bolts open, one at the top and one at the bottom. The wind snatched the door from her hands and slammed it, hard, into her chest and the box tumbled to the floor, hitting the quarry tiles with a loud crack. The lid flew open.

She shrank away, expecting something hideous inside, but it was empty. Nothing at all but a dirty, wooden shell. She wanted to laugh.

The snow that had piled up against the door fell onto her feet but she hardly noticed the chill. With a shout of triumph, she launched the box into the night. It landed silently about ten feet away and disappeared into the snow. It seemed fitting that something had eaten it.

Her knees gave way and she sank to the floor in relief. The snow soaked through her jeans but she didn’t care. Beth sat in the near dark with her back against the outside door and cried.

Stillness surrounded her. That snow silence. Breathtakingly beautiful. But she wanted to be back in suburbia so much it hurt.

After a few minutes, she eased herself up on numb, wet legs and pushed the door shut. She pulled off her soaking indoor boots and stood them next to the back boiler, bolted the door, and double locked it, aware that her hands were shaking.

Inside, the temperature had fallen dramatically. It would take a little while for the house to warm up again after the arctic blast from the door.

Then, she realized—Gabriel was quiet. Sprinting up the stairs, her heart began to race.

Her baby lay happily in the dark, clutching something in his fat little fists and gnawing away, little slurping noises as his mouth worked.

She reached blindly for the light—hadn’t she left it on?—it flickered, and came to life.

Gabriel chewed happily on the end of the thermometer she’d dropped downstairs.

She snatched it away from him, crying out. He stared at her in shock and his eyes filled up with tears. She lifted him from the cot, pulling him close, and rocking him back and forth as though the act of comforting him would ease her fear. She ached all over and her head throbbed. Quite possibly she was losing her mind.

She wasn’t sure how long she stood there. All remained quiet, any sounds from outside muffled by the blanket of snow. In any other context, it would be beautiful. But all she felt was trapped. She forced herself to carry Gabriel out of the nursery. The door to the spare room stood open but any unsettling vibrations had disappeared. It was simply a room.

Her legs trembled as she crept downstairs. This had to be the beginnings of flu, didn’t it? After she’d fed Gabriel, she would check the boiler. The living room still seemed cool. She rifled through the small emergency stock of baby food jars until she found one she knew he liked. Spaghetti Bolognese. Strangely, he preferred his food at room temperature. When she’d first noticed his preference, she had laughed and said ‘just like your Daddy!’ Stu always took so long to eat his dinner that it had to be cold by the time he finished.

The thought of Stu brought a lump to her throat again. Feeding Gabriel from the jar, she grabbed her phone and swiped the screen to dial. No ringtone. She tried again. This time, a message flicked up: network busy. A sudden icicle of fear ran down her spine. She was truly cut off.

She peeled a ripe banana and gave half to Gabriel. Most of it would end up smeared over the highchair tray and his face, but she couldn’t stop his independence even if she wanted to. She thought about the thermometer again. Was it possible she could have taken it upstairs and dropped it in his cot? It seemed a long shot, but she was open to all offers.

Outside the kitchen window, the snow lay banked up on the windowsill. It looked like a Christmas card. Beth peered into the darkness. She could barely make out the hedge by the road; it was a solid mountain of white.

Her eyes darted to where she had thrown the box. All traces of it had disappeared. So why did she still feel like it had taken her sanity with it?

***

It had no name in human language. At one point, it had been a living thing, but now all that remained was a corrupted essence, one that could reason and scheme.

It was triumphant in its release. Freedom, inside the house.

It had no need now for its wooden prison. For far too many years—centuries—it had raged there, kept alive by the knowledge that its work was not yet done. Humans had tricked it into its prison, and a human would be its vessel to carry out the plan. The woman was slowly unravelling. It would not take too much more before she did something...reckless.

But first, it had to feed off her fear. Taking root in the child demanded strength, and that was best served with a cold slice of terror.

Let her gain a small sense of ease. It could wait till full dark.

Chapter Four

By the time Beth had cleared up Gabriel’s battle with the banana it was 6pm. Usually, the road hummed with commuter traffic, headlights slicing the dark, but tonight, nothing disturbed the air of snow calm. The world outside had gone to sleep.

The temperature had sorted itself out, too, and she found herself humming a nursery rhyme as she ran Gabriel his bath. With the curtains drawn and the discovery of a frozen ready meal one step up from cheese on toast, her fears from earlier seemed the product of an overly active imagination. She rehearsed in her head what she would say to Stu if he asked where the box had gone. I dropped it and it fell to pieces. Or I sent it away to be restored. But it didn’t matter; she would cross that bridge when she came to it.

Gabriel loved to play in the water and she ended up more than damp. Back to his old self, he splashed in the bubbles and squealed with joy every time she let his yellow duck bob to the surface. She sang the words to Ring-a-ring-a-roses to him and he giggled, not that she could sing but he didn’t seem to mind.

The scent of lavender baby bath floated across the whole upstairs as she dressed Gabriel in his pyjamas. They were a set from Christmas—white flannel with silver snowflakes. She didn’t want him to be cold if the temperature fell again overnight. They had learned to keep the boiler running constantly on a low setting, otherwise it took forever to warm up again in the morning.

Carrying him downstairs, clutching his favourite yellow lion, the house cocooned them in warmth and safety. She fed him his nighttime bottle, both of them snuggled under a mohair throw. The Sandman came before it was half finished. Gently, she pulled it from his mouth, smiling as his jaw worked in the instinctive sucking motion. He was still her baby boy.

For a few seconds, she toyed with the idea of putting him down in his pram, but then she might disturb him when she had to carry him up to bed. She yawned. For all of her insistence that she wouldn’t sleep at all tonight, bed was a very lovely thought.

She carried him to the nursery carefully and laid him in his cot, tucking his duvet around him. The little lions jumped through their hoops and gambolled around like lambs on his cover. It seemed silly but she always felt like they would protect him. When she went to search for Gabriel’s toy lion, she found that it was missing. He must have dropped it when he’d fallen asleep.

Still humming, she went downstairs, half wondering what temperature to put the oven on for dinner. The throw lay over the chair arm, and the orange tuft of the lion’s tail peeked out from beneath it.

Picking up the throw, she reached for the lion. Her blood turned to ice in her veins.

Its head had been completely torn off.

A strangled sob rose in her throat. She backed away, not believing what her eyes were telling her. Now, she was very much awake and all of her instincts were telling her to run.

Chapter Five

The lights quivered again.

Beth turned to run, but only managed to stumble to the bottom of the staircase. She grabbed the handrail and hauled herself up, her mind set on only one thing: Gabriel. A shadow flickered across the landing, but it wasn’t until she was almost at the top that she saw what was causing it. The lonely ceiling light bulb was gently swinging to and fro. She caught the scream in her mouth before it could be heard.

Gabriel’s door was shut. She was sure she hadn’t left it that way.

Her heart fell like a lift in freefall. She grabbed for the iron latch handle but every second played like a movie in slow-motion, moving frame by frame. The door stuck fast and she launched her full weight against it. When it finally gave way, she tumbled through, landing on the floor on her hands and knees.

Gabriel lay fast asleep, one thumb tucked inside his mouth.

The relief nearly brought her to her knees again. Scooping him up, she turned for the door. A floorboard creaked. Something ran the full length of the landing. This time, she screamed.

The doorway was her only way out—attempting to climb out of the window would be suicide. She inched out onto the landing, afraid of what might be there but too afraid to stay put. Her eyes darted along the length, lingering in the shadowy corners, but nothing was amiss.

With her heart trip-hammering in her chest, she crept downstairs with her back against the wall. Gabriel stirred in her arms. In the silence, her heartbeat pounded in her ears. She drew level with the living room door, trying to formulate a plan of escape, but fear had lined her mind with quicksand. All rational thought sank into the mire.

The temperature plummeted as though someone had opened a freezer door. She wheeled round. The footsteps started again. This time, treading slowly down the creaking stairs. But there was nothing there.

Stumbling across the living room, she grabbed the iron poker from the hearth set. She brandished it like a sword and turned, half paralysed by fear but ready to do anything she could to protect her son.

An icy draught licked around her feet, and a strange scent assaulted her senses. A putrid, cloying sweetness laced with stale blood. Her gag reflex fired up and she backed away, her ankles catching on the stone hearth.

‘Get away from me!’ she screamed, waving the poker at a threat she couldn’t see, only smell—and somehow, that was worse.

Gabriel murmured and she dropped to one knee to balance him. A noise, like the skittering of a thousand insects, skipped across the floor and a frigid breeze passed so close to her face that it swept her hair from her brow. She recoiled in horror, burying her face against Gabriel’s head.

The lights went out. And stayed out.

In total darkness a slow scraping began. The dragging of furniture across the floor. The skittering was everywhere at once, on the walls, under the floor, behind her in the chimney. All she could do was hold Gabriel tight and pray.

Suddenly, the skittering stopped. Beth held her breath. Gabriel stopped mid-cry. The light in the kitchen flickered first, then the one in the hallway.

She gasped, a sharp intake of breath that made Gabriel whimper. All of the furniture stood, heaped in the centre of the room. A pile of chairs and tables and lamps, defying the laws of gravity and reason. A dining chair supported a side table with the sofa balanced on one edge. Out to the side, like wings, were the two high-backed chairs from the fireside. A standard lamp stood upside down, its cord trailing down into space. But it was lit. She stared in disbelief, half expecting for it all to come crashing down and crush them.

She glanced down at Gabriel. He was staring transfixed at the hearth. She followed his gaze. Thin tendrils of smoke drifted in from the chimney—two swirling lines that came together, then separated, curling inside itself, lazily tasting the air.

With trembling legs, Beth forced herself to stand. The smoke rose, spreading in a slow, measured ebb and flow. It looked like it was breathing. She was beyond fear now, trapped in that primeval place of fight or flight.

She ran for the kitchen, where her phone lay on the countertop. Grabbing it, she stuffed it into her pocket as she made for the door. Better to take their chances outside than stay another moment with whatever had infested their home. But desperation and agitation crushed that tiny, nurtured hope. She had double bolted the door earlier—when she thought throwing the box in the snow would fix everything.

Gabriel squirmed in her arms, his wide blue eyes fearful. It was her job to keep him safe. Something kicked into place deep within her. She whirled, sliding the top bolt open with one forceful push. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the insidious smoke curling through the kitchen, long tendrils like bony fingers, searching.

She kicked the bottom bolt with her foot. A sharp pain coursed through her ankle but she kicked it again. It gave, begrudgingly, and she yanked open the door. There, blocking them in, was a snowdrift—at least four feet tall. Her stomach lurched; they weren’t going anywhere.

She pulled out her phone but it slipped from her fingers, clattering onto the stone tiles. The screen shattered. This was it then. She had backed them into a corner and the snow had sealed them into a winter tomb.

‘Please....please.’ She begged now, all other options exhausted. ‘Don’t hurt my baby.’ Tears ran down her face and Gabriel grabbed for them, his own eyes filling up.

The smoke darkened and rose until it became a pillar. She stood with the open door behind her, one hand shielding Gabriel’s face. Stars glittered overhead. It had stopped snowing. Somewhere in the woods, a fox barked.

Beth Davenport stared into the depths of the pillar, certain that she was looking straight into her own demise.

Chapter Six

Reverend Noah Isaacs cursed under his breath, which wasn’t very fitting considering his vocation. Snow piled over the top of his wellingtons, melting and filling them with a freezing cold slush. He pulled the hood of his winter parka more snugly around his chin and continued his laborious, high-stepping journey up the lane. His car lay in a ditch about half a mile away. Not his best decision to try and make it home. Whoever said that God looked after his own clearly hadn’t a clue.

The call to visit Mrs. Langley had come early. The vicarage phone rang as he sat eating toast, watching the local news. It had to be one of his older parishioners—everyone else used his mobile. Joan Seymour, who always went to help Irene Langley out of bed, was obviously upset.

‘Can you come now, Father? I don’t think she has long left.’

Noah oozed sympathy whilst chewing his toast at the other side of his mouth and ruminating on why she addressed him as ‘father’ despite the fact that he wasn’t Roman Catholic. He should have known. A cold snap like this usually finished off the most fragile of his flock.

Irene Langley had departed this world at 4.10 p.m. and it had taken until around 7 to make the necessary arrangements. By then, the snow lay far too deep for most people to even consider trying a car journey, but Noah didn’t relish the idea of spending the night with his dead parishioner. Just because he dealt in death didn’t mean he actually liked it.

He stared into the darkness, his torch beam bouncing back from the whiteout surface. Damn the no street lights ruling. One day, he would get a job somewhere nearer civilisation. The hedges loomed like sleeping albino mammoths. He had no idea how far he had come. The landmark post box in the wall had been obliterated along with everything else. The road curved—or was that his snow-blind imagination? He rubbed his eyes with the back of a cold, stiff glove.

In the darkness, a lonely light shone out. Noah swiped the wet hair out of his eyes. Frigid air stiffened his brows and lashes. He didn’t know where the light was coming from, but he hoped someone inside would take pity on a half frozen and soaked-to-the-skin man of the cloth. Spurred on by the thought of a good cup of tea—or something stronger—he battled on.

He seemed to have been struggling knee deep in the thick snow for hours. Every single muscle in his body screamed in protest. He couldn’t feel his feet or his face. But at least it had finally stopped snowing.

Constellations winked down on him with tireless disinterest. Throwing back his hood, he raised his head, his laboured breath coming in small white clouds. Orion, The Plough, The Big Dipper—he knew them all. It had been a toss-up between astronomy and faith when he had to make a career choice. God had won out, but he sometimes wondered if his calling had been a drunken decision based on the amount of holiday time he assumed the clergy received.

The light seemed definitely closer now and he could make out the shape of the building. Must be the old farmhouse the couple from London had bought in the summer. Eleanor Grimsby, the woman who cleaned for him, had said they had a baby too. But they weren’t churchgoers.

Noah stopped and rubbed the back of his neck. The fine hairs at his nape had begun to prickle. Something was wrong, but he couldn’t put a finger on it. At nearing forty, he knew that when instinct punched you in the gut, you listened.

He nearly walked straight into the gate by the hedge; his eyes were glued on the open doorway, and the churning in his stomach had nothing to do with the chicken sandwich Joan Seymour had put in front of him at lunch.

‘Hello?’ His voice sounded odd in the winter stillness. Why was the door wide open on a night like this?

He blinked hard. Twice. Could that be smoke? He watched, transfixed for a moment. His skin chilled. But not from cold. He slipped his hand into his pocket and closed around a small book of psalms. Irene Langley had been particularly fond of psalms.

‘Hello? Is everything okay?’

The gate stood solid against his pushes, so he gave up and clambered over, cursing again as his feet floundered for grip in the drifts. Snow shoes, he thought. When this is over, I’ll buy snow shoes. I’m too unfit to be carrying on like this.

He tucked the book inside the front of his coat, somehow glad of its closeness. From inside the farmhouse, a baby cried. It was the sound of acute distress.

Noah found strength from a sudden flush of adrenaline, pushing through the snow with legs that were both numb and on fire. He didn’t want to believe that the smoke was behaving erratically. It seemed as if it were forming the shape of...

He drew out the psalm book and held it aloft.

‘This is the word of God!’

The pillar of smoke stopped moving. Noah thought the glint of an eye opened from somewhere deep within, but surely that had to be a trick of the light? A terrible skittering echoed over the snow and the baby’s cry grew louder.

‘Leave the child!’ Noah took a guess and a gamble. The psalm book felt warm and comforting in his hand. ‘He is a member of the Christian church. You will not taint him.’

It could all go horribly wrong. If the baby was a girl. If the child had not been christened. After all, it wasn’t traditional anymore. And what if the parents weren’t Christian? Thoughts flickered through Noah’s mind but he quenched them, sending them spiralling down into his unconscious.

Halfway down the path, Noah’s boot caught something hidden in the snow. He fell, coughing and spluttering, aware of the silence as the snow swallowed him whole. He dropped the book and scrabbled madly for it, frozen fingers closing over the spine as if it was a hotline to heaven. Above him, the stars still watched. With some difficulty, he found his legs again and raised his head and shoulders above the snow line. The smoke rushed at him in a plume of noxious air, filling his nose and lungs, suffocating the breath from his body. Inside his skull, a voice hissed—a frustrated and thwarted serpent’s tongue, the words alien but filled with venom.

Just as Noah thought he might pass out, his breathing eased. White lights flashed behind his eyes, and then they were plunged into darkness.

The smoke hovered above him, blocking his view of the stars. Then, with a noise like sucking air from a bottle, it condensed into a small, black ball and disappeared.

Noah eased himself from the confines of his snow hole, not wanting to believe what he had witnessed. Did being close to hypothermia make you hallucinate? But his gut told him this had been no hallucination.

The baby’s cries sounded weaker now. Alarmed, Noah clambered to his feet, pushing himself through the last wall of snow before the doorway. The drift finally gave way to the level ground of the entrance. A woman sat hunched on the floor with her back towards the door, her arms around an infant dressed in pyjamas. Noah knelt down, his knees cracking. His arms trembled.

‘You’re safe now,’ he murmured, reaching for the woman’s hand. It was ice cold.

She lifted her head, her dark hair dusted with snowflakes. Her eyes looked right through him. Noah’s breath left his body in a long exhale. The baby started to wail again, its lower lip quivering at the sight of a stranger.

The woman didn’t move. She was in an extreme state of shock. Noah had seen it once in his college days when a student jumped from a four-storey accommodation block. The young woman who witnessed it had that same expression on her face.

But they couldn’t stay in the doorway; they would freeze to death. Although the snow had stopped, a chill north wind whistled over the fields. Noah gently eased the baby from the woman’s arms. It squirmed in his grip, despite all the shushing noises he made. He didn’t have any experience with infants, apart from the odd christening that might come his way. They were tiny versions of adults with no sense of reasoning.

He held the baby tightly, in what he hoped was the right way, and walked into the living room. It felt wrong to be in someone’s house without an invite. He stopped dead and his mouth fell open.

All of the furniture lay in a makeshift heap in the middle of the room, like someone—something—had been planning a giant bonfire. An old-fashioned pram lay tipped to one side near the hearth. He righted it with one hand, straightening the crumpled bedding inside. A blue, felt rabbit with a happy smile stared up at him. A boy then. At least that part of his guess had turned out right. Carefully, he laid the baby down. The noise level of his upset increased. But Noah knew he had to get the woman into some warmth.

A throw lay on the ground in the doorway that led to the hall. He picked it up, his eyes still drawn to the pile of furniture. What in God’s name had caused that? But God had had nothing to do with it.

In the outside doorway, the woman hadn’t moved. He slid his arm around her and hoisted her to her feet. She made no attempt to help or deter him. Her eyes, staring and desolate, bored through his skull. She let him walk her into the kitchen, but she froze solid at the sight of the living room. Noah eased her down onto a kitchen chair and wrapped the throw around her shoulders.

He paddled through the slush in the hallway, and putting his whole weight against the front door, managed to close it. The remains of a mobile phone lay scattered in the mess, bits of broken screen floating like little boats. He slid the bolts shut with a resounding click and the boiler fired up with a reassuring belch. At least the house should start to warm now.

He knelt down beside the woman and grasped her cold hand. ‘You have nothing to be afraid of. My name is Noah Isaacs. I’m the Reverend at St Jude’s at the top of the hill. Your baby is safe. Can you tell me your name?’

The woman didn’t acknowledge that he was even there.

Noah looked around the kitchen. By the coffee maker, a few unopened letters sat on the counter. He flicked through them and found a postcard with a photo of a Swiss chalet at the top of a picturesque mountain. Feeling like a voyeur, Noah turned it over.

Dear Stu, Beth and Gabriel,

Perfect ski-ing weather. Chalet great and the girls feed us a banquet every night. Sorry you couldn’t come this year, maybe next? Gabriel can learn to ski before he can run!

Love,

Amy and Steve

Knowing their names made Noah feel more comfortable. The baby (Gabriel) had quietened a little bit. Noah tiptoed in and found him chewing the end of his thumb. His colour seemed better.

Noah searched around but couldn’t find a house phone. His mobile was missing in action. It must have slid off the dashboard when his car met with the ditch. He sighed as he peeled off his soaking coat and his boots. Lumps of snow fell out onto the floor. His thighs itched as feeling slowly began to seep through his numb flesh. He went upstairs and grabbed a towel from the bathroom.

The main bedroom door stood open. It was a pretty room with vintage, floral curtains and a cream iron bedstead. A canvas hung above the bed. A wedding shot of the woman downstairs. She was smiling, dark hair swept into an elegant bun. The man beside her, a few inches taller, gazed down on his new bride with adoration. The woman in the kitchen resembled a cardboard cut-out of this image.

A floorboard creaked under Noah’s feet and he stopped, holding his breath. Whatever had been in this house had gone, but the sense of it remained.

He poked his head around the other doors. There was the nursery, with families of little orange lions dancing about, and a jungle mobile with brightly-coloured parrots and giraffes that hung above the cot. There was nothing to suggest anything bad had happened. The other room, stuffed with suitcases and general clutter, had that certain air of a room not often used. Noah went downstairs, his mind trying to pull rational thought out of the mire he had wandered into.

Beth still hadn’t moved, but he managed to half walk, half manoeuvre her into the living room. She stopped suddenly, her eyes fixed on the upheaval of furniture. He didn’t want to force her to move, but the chaos in here was obviously unsettling her. He left her standing, her face devoid of any colour, whilst he pulled and righted tables and chairs from the heap. The sofa weighed a ton. He pushed it across the floor in a crab-like fashion, then gently moved a sleeping Gabriel beside it. Beth watched him with her arms hanging listlessly at her sides.

Noah led her to the sofa. He had to physically move her shoulders and pick up her legs to make her lay down but finally, she accepted. He covered her with the throw. As an afterthought, he grabbed his psalm book from where he had dumped it in the kitchen, and tucked it under her arm. He hoped it would bring her a little peace.

They were totally cut off from the outside world. All he could do was wait it out and hope that by tomorrow, someone would pass by. He made some tea and toast, still trying to make sense of what had happened and try to forget it at the same time. There was only one person he could go to about this—the only man who wouldn’t think he had been at the whiskey too much, or had managed to lose half of his marbles in the cold.

Chapter Seven

Stu Davenport was brought back down to earth by the bartender’s bored monotone.

‘A refill, sir?’ he asked, in the kind of voice that couldn’t have given a damn whether Stu said yes, no, or are there Martians in the restaurant? Stu tapped his fingers along the side of his glass. He caught sight of his reflection in the mirror, under the optics; a man in an open shirt, with tired eyes and hair that needed a decent cut, stared back at him.

‘No, thanks,’ he replied, sliding from the barstool. He couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong.

All the way into work, he had chewed over how edgy Beth had been that morning. She wasn’t the kind of woman who did needy. It was her independence (and wicked sense of humour) that had drawn him to her in the first place.

He didn’t realise how bad the weather had got until after he had come out of his conference call. The police were already advising people not to travel, which was all well and good if you were tucked up at home and not staring out of the office window, weighing the odds of getting home in one piece. Stu was on his way out of the office, quite prepared to take his chance on the roads, when Alan King, one of the contractors on this latest project, had called him from another room.

‘Stu, wait up!’ A shiny bald head flashed by the interior window and appeared in the doorway with its owner. ‘Just had the traffic update on. The motorway is at gridlock. Some idiot ran into the back of a milk tanker and there’s only one lane open. I don’t think you’ve got much chance of getting through.’

Alan was a nice enough guy, but he was one of those people who liked a bit of drama. Stu swore under his breath.

‘I could cut through, go cross country.’ Mentally, he was already out of the door.

Alan paused, for effect. ‘The loop road is shut anyway—bridge repairs—and my wife rang to say the B roads going your way are hellish. The snowploughs haven’t even been out yet. Typical Brit weather panic.’ He grinned.

‘Thanks, Alan,’ he replied out of politeness. In his head, he wondered how Alan had come to be such a little ray of sunshine.

Stu called the lift and joined three other people with their heads bowed, studying the flickering screens of their phones. This was one day where leaving the rat race and becoming a bee keeper seemed incredibly appealing.

He had every intention of getting in the car and attempting the journey—until the view from the lobby stopped him in his tracks. It was snowing so heavily, he could barely see to the other side of the road.

Chapter Eight

Nothing tasted like freedom. But freedom laced with the sting of failure was a bitter pill to swallow. Wheeling and racing like a flock of birds at dusk, the box demon vented its frustration at anything in its path. A patch of orchard, protected by the side of a barn, lay scorched and broken in the snow. A tractor overturned in a ditch. A small pony huddled by a hedge for shelter sent careering off into belly-deep snow. It stood, wide eyed and sweating, its off side hind leg dangling uselessly. Birds watched from the safety of their roosts in nooks of trees and eaves, crawling creatures remained motionless in the undergrowth.

For decades, it had waited—incarcerated inside the box—waiting for a man such as Stu Davenport. The child had almost been its host. It had got so close it had tasted the flesh and blood, the innocence waiting to be tainted. Too many years had passed since it had been in control of a bone-filled vessel. Too many years since it had used that vessel for its own needs.

The priest would pay for his interruption. But for now, it had to rest.

Curled up, blackly, in the hollow of an oak tree, it seethed and devoured its hate.

Chapter Nine

The sound of a baby crying pulled Noah from a fitful sleep. Childhood nightmares had haunted his dreams. The memory of his father sweeping the contents of the altar table to the floor. The rolling clink of metal hitting metal. The smell of dust and beeswax as Noah huddled behind a pew, too frightened to move. A metallic taste clung to the roof of his mouth as he opened his eyes. The crying notched up another level and he raised himself from the chair where he’d slept, his back aching in protest. Gabriel was wide awake. Beth, still in the same position Noah had left her in, seemed soundly asleep.

Early morning sunlight pierced through the kitchen window. Noah glanced at the clock. 8.55 a.m. Gabriel had woken once in the night and taken half a bottle before drifting back off. Thank God Beth had left some in the fridge, although Noah thought even he could follow the instructions on the formula drum.

The sun bounced off the snow’s surface, making him wince at its ferocity. A glacier-blue sky smiled down, as though yesterday’s blizzard had been a momentary lapse. Looking towards the road, he could make out the trench he had pushed through last night. New snow softened the scarred edges of his struggles. A robin perched on the lower branches of the apple tree, waiting for anything that might be willing to surface.

He put the bottle inside the microwave, ignoring his reflection mirrored in the glass door. God, he could use a cigarette—even though he’d given up five years ago. The microwave pinged and he retrieved the bottle, shaking it as Gabriel’s voice went into overdrive. There didn’t seem anything wrong with him, but Beth, she was a cause for concern. Something spooked the robin and Noah paused mid shake—somewhere on the lane came the lumbering sound of heavy wheels.

He ran into the living room and scooped Gabriel out of his pram. He was bright red from crying, but hungry enough to settle as soon as the bottle teat hit his lips. He was also soaking wet. Noah hadn’t thought much about nappies.

The noise outside became louder, a definite chugging of a diesel engine. Relief flooded his limbs. With Gabriel still sucking noisily, he unbolted the door. He tried to compose himself, but all he wanted to do was jump up and down with elation.

An icy chill met his face as he swung the door open. Across the top of the hedges, puffs of black smoke curled up, into the air. For a few seconds, his breath caught in his throat. Then, he realised the smoke was coming from a tractor stack. The loud chug from the diesel engine split through the silence of the snow-capped morning, but Noah thought he had never heard such a sweet sound. He waited until the top of the cab came into view, and started waving furiously.

***

Tom Jacobson hadn’t wanted to get out of bed that morning. It had been unusually warm and comfortable under the covers. Downstairs in the kitchen, his wife, Betty, made the usual morning sounds. Soon, the smell of bacon would drift up the stairs and tempt him to move.

He was a fourth generation farmer, but the getting up early gene had passed him by. His great grandfather had purchased the farm, keeping beef cattle and a small flock of sheep. His father had diversified and swung to arable, which Tom had inherited, but Tom had bought a small herd of Gloucester Old Spots because he liked pigs. Now, he was nearing sixty and everything got that bit harder each year. When Betty had suggested they renovate the old cow barn and turn it into a farm café selling jams she made in the kitchen, he had jumped at the chance. His great-grandfather would probably turn in his grave, but Tom had every intention of being around for a few years yet.

‘Thomas Jacobson! Get yourself down here and eat this before you go out and clear that lane!’ Betty’s use of his full name meant there was no room for compromise.

As if on cue, the aroma of bacon filtered upstairs. Grumbling, Tom swung out of bed and eased himself into thick clothes.

In the kitchen, Betty dried her hands on a tea towel, and then set down a hearty sandwich and a large mug of tea. She was a small woman with long, grey hair, roughly plaited. They had married over forty years ago, and Tom loved her as much now as he did then. She had never let him leave the house without breakfast in all of their married years.

She put her hands on his shoulders and kissed the bald spot on the top of his head. ‘It’s neighbourly to clear the lane. You know we’ll be waiting till next Christmas for a snow plough. They divert them all to Lower Grassendon, where the councillors live.’ She wrinkled her nose in disgust. She had no love for county politics after the run-in they’d had trying to convert the barn.

An hour later, Tom sat in his tractor cab, turning left onto the lane and into the village. Only a few houses dotted the sides, the main hub of rural life being at the other side of the river. A couple of new housing developments had swelled the head count to nearly three thousand. Tom could remember when it was below five hundred, but that was back in the days when the river would burst its banks during any prolonged rainfall.

Meadowford Bridge was an odd little village, nestled atop the slope of a hill range, which made its roads steep in places. When he was a boy, Tom’s father had told him the sheep all had two legs shorter on one side from grazing the hills. He surveyed the countryside from his viewpoint, smiling at the remembrance; it was a grand day to be out, even with the cold.

The tractor made easy work of the deep snow, and it cut through the white powder like a knife through soft icing. Occasionally, it hit a frozen mound where the wind had blasted across the fields. Tom pulled his scarf over his mouth and hummed. At least he was sure he wouldn’t meet anything coming the other way. Not like in summer, when the tourists glowered up at him for daring to be on the road during their holiday time.

The thatched roof of the neighbouring farmhouse came into view as he swung around the bend. It had been the old dairy farm when his grandfather had been alive. Tom remembered helping with the milking as a small boy and drinking milk straight from the churn, scooped out by a metal jug. There was none of that pasteurisation nonsense then. And he wasn’t dead yet.

The farmhouse was still a pretty building. The new couple from the city hadn’t ruined it by adding modern bits and bobs. Yet. His eyes ran over the snow-covered thatch and wide windows. He felt a sudden pang for the people he had known in those halcyon days of never-ending summers. But it was chased away in an instant.

In the doorway, someone was waving frantically at him with a red-checked tea towel.

Chapter Ten

Noah and Tom stood in Beth’s farmhouse kitchen drinking mugs of strong, hot tea.

‘I never had you down as being particularly techie, Tom, but thank God you had your phone.’

Tom raised a bushy eyebrow and looked at Noah through the steam hovering over his tea.

Noah made a mental note to try and cut down on his less-than-perfect language.

‘Betty wouldn’t let me out of the house without it. What would you do if you ended up in a ditch, she says. I say that I’d dust myself off and walk home like I’ve always done, but you know women...’ He tailed off, and Noah hid a smile. Older people didn’t know how to talk about priests and women in the same breath.

Noah glanced out towards the window as heavy machinery sounded down the lane. He squinted against the low sun. ‘Well, would you believe it? It’s a snow plough. Better late than never.’

‘That will be Betty’s doing. She’s got a hotline to that councillor woman. They have run-ins at least three times a year over something or other. I think they both enjoy it.’ Tom’s wife had gone up in Noah’s estimation since Tom had made his first phone call home. On hearing that a mother and baby were in trouble, she had been at the door in less than twenty minutes, bundled up in a blue parka and an Icelandic-style blue-and-grey hat with woollen plaits—a Christmas present from one of her granddaughters.

Gabriel was swooped up, changed and fed, and then Betty had left him with the two men whilst she gathered extra clothes and toys from the nursery in case she had to take charge of him. But Beth worried her the most. Noah had left out the details of the phantom smoke and said he had found her in the doorway.

‘I’ve rung Doctor Hardcastle and explained,’ she said, packing Gabriel’s formula and a few jars of baby food from the cupboard. ‘Beth doesn’t seem to be physically hurt, but he asked if I could run her down to the surgery in about an hour. That’s why I got right on to Joanne Daley about clearing the lane.’ She swung Gabriel expertly onto one hip and he grabbed for one of the plaits, stuffing it into his mouth.

‘I’ll get this little boy checked out, too, whilst I’m there.’ She wiped the drool from Gabriel’s chin and he buried his head into her coat. ‘Can one of you men find Beth’s car keys and get the car seat out? Once you’ve finished your tea, of course.’

Noah smiled to himself as Tom gulped down the last dregs. That last comment from his wife was a definite command.

***

Noah found Beth’s car keys in her bag, by the side of the bed. He also found Stu’s business card in the back of her wallet and decided to ring the main office number first. In minutes, he had got through to SK International. A man named Alan answered the extension Noah asked for.

‘Sorry, he’s not here. You can try him on his mobile, but he’s driving home.’ Alan offered. ‘I hope there isn’t anything wrong?’ His tone suggested that if there was he would grab it with both hands and spread it around the office before the phone went cold.

Noah decided to err on the side of caution. He was going to ask Alan to get Stu to ring back in case he didn’t answer unknown numbers, but Betty was having no such nonsense. She took charge of the mobile and confirmed Stu’s number in less than ten seconds. Noah almost felt sorry for Alan; the woman was a true force of nature.

After Beth and Gabriel had been loaded into Betty’s estate car and Tom had cleared the gateway with his tractor, Noah found himself alone in the house. Betty had left her phone and strict instructions to stay put and told him that she would call later.

The strange stillness of an unfamiliar house pressed against him. Noah’s ears were fine-tuned to each rattle and creak. From upstairs, a clock ticked far too loudly. The fridge and freezer clinked and whirred and the tap dripped slowly in the kitchen sink. He found his thoughts wandering back to the events of last night. They seemed unreal.

He tried to put comforting words together in his head before he rang Stu’s number. Trying to find the right balance of truth and reassurance, he clutched Betty’s phone as he paced the living room, mentally rehearsing. A tuft of orange fur caught his eye under the chair where he’d spent the night. He bent down to pick it up. It was half of a toy lion—the tail end—and the head was nowhere to be seen. Noah’s mouth dried up. As much as he wanted to categorise what had happened last night into a neat little pigeon hole, he knew something beyond his scope of understanding had occurred. No sane explanation existed.

He pressed the green dial button.

Stu answered after three rings, his voice formal and slightly cold. The buzz of traffic sounded in the background.

‘Mr Davenport. It’s Noah Isaacs here from St Jude’s in Meadowford Bridge.’ He wondered if Stu even knew the name of his local church. ‘I’m at your house. Beth’s not well, but she’s on her way to the doctor as we speak. Please don’t worry. Her phone isn’t working and I’ve only just got your number.’

‘What happened? Is Gabriel okay?’ He had Stu’s full attention now.

‘Yes, Gabriel is fine. Betty Jacobson has him. He’s in good hands.’

Stu swore under his breath. A blare from a car horn bore into Noah’s ear.

‘Sorry....Reverend...the roads are hell.’ Noah imagined his hands tight on the steering wheel. ‘Is Beth hurt? Damn it, I knew I should have tried to make it home yesterday!’

‘Please don’t blame yourself.’ He wanted to add that even if Stu had got home, there was nothing he could have done to prevent Beth’s condition. It wasn’t in any medical dictionary.

‘I’ll be home in about two hours, if the roads give me a break. Tell Beth...’

There was a sudden terrible sound of screeching brakes. A horrible, ear-piercing cry, and the heavy crunch of metal. The phone in Noah’s hand went dead.

Chapter Eleven

Noah sat in the formal study of Meadowford House, which had the distinction of being the oldest house in Meadowford Bridge. No one from around here ever called it by the name engraved in stone by its grand door—it was, simply, The Manor.

He felt as if he had aged ten years in one day. Had it been fewer than twenty-four hours since he had trudged up the hill in the snow?

A knock at the door interrupted Noah’s thoughts, and before he could say anything, the door swung open and a plump woman with red cheeks and a shock of pinned-up, grey curls entered, carrying a tray. Ella Rodgers smiled and set it down on the desk.

‘Now you look as if you haven’t eaten all day, so I took it upon myself to make you a sandwich. I hope roast beef is okay. If you had arrived an hour or so earlier, you could have joined us all for dinner. Mr. Carver doesn’t get that many visitors.’ She busied herself pouring Noah tea from a china teapot and handed him a linen napkin.

‘Really, you shouldn’t have—’ he began but was immediately shushed.

‘It’s no trouble at all. I can’t have a half-starved man in the house. Where would my reputation be?’ She smiled and offered Noah sugar. ‘Mr. Carver sends his apologies. He’ll only be a few minutes. If you need anything else, just ring the bell.’ She motioned to a brass bell on the desk. It looked as if it had been stolen from a 1930’s hotel reception.

Now, it was Noah’s turn to smile. Edward Carver hadn’t changed at all. They had met at a funeral (not one Noah was officially part of) and instantly bonded, even though Carver was older by a decade and their passions poles apart.

Noah picked up his plate and attacked his sandwich with gusto. He wondered if he should get himself an Ella, someone who would make sure supper didn’t consist of a cheese omelette and two fingers of whisky, someone who would make sure he never came home to a dark house. It all seemed so clichéd though, a Reverend and his housekeeper. And Noah wasn’t ready to be compartmentalised, though he knew his meagre flock wanted to mould him into his predecessor.

A voice that he recognised came from the outside hallway. Noah stood as the door flew open.

‘Noah! My God, man, how are you? I thought your parishioners had eaten you.’ The imposing man with slightly greying hair and a short beard clapped him on the back, causing Noah to cough. Edward Carver—impeccably dressed and groomed, as always. Noah had rarely seen him out of a suit or smart jacket.

‘Yes, I know. I am horrible at keeping in touch.’ He grasped the man’s hand tightly. Where to start? Suddenly, his words dried up and stuck at the back of his throat with the crumbs from his sandwich. Though the two men lived only miles apart, it had been months since his last visit. And that was Noah’s fault. The invitations to supper had been numerous, but he had always made the excuse that church life kept him far too busy. But he knew the truth of it was this house and what they did here.

Carver studied his face and the laughter died in his eyes. ‘Come through to the parlour. The fire is lit. We won’t be disturbed.’ He ushered Noah across the hallway and into a much larger room at the front of the house.

A wry smile played on Noah’s lips. It could have come straight off the set of the latest Sherlock Holmes movie. An ornate cast iron fireplace housed a log fire, which blazed a welcome. Two wing back, green leather chairs sat at either side of the hearth, the leather shiny with age and use. Heavy, red velvet curtains screened the window, and on every surface, there seemed to be a book or stack of books. A small marble bust looked down from the mantle. Whoever it had been had a large wart on the side of his nose and Noah felt his eyes drifting back to it.

He sat, grateful for the heat from the fire. Since last night, he’d had trouble keeping warm. A large aspidistra loomed over his right shoulder. Carver placed a crystal tumbler in Noah’s hand, half full with brandy.

‘I assume you still drink? And if you don’t, you do tonight. You look hellish, Noah.’

Noah gazed into his glass, swirling the amber liquid around. He pursed his lips and a chill crawled along his spine, despite the strength of the flames.

‘I need your help, Carver. There’s something evil in my parish.’

Chapter Twelve

It was nearly 10 p.m. when Noah finished reliving his last twenty-four hours. Carver had listened calmly, occasionally asking questions whenever Noah stalled. His glass was topped up more than once, and now that he was spent, he wasn’t sure if the warm glow he was feeling was from unburdening himself, the fire, or the alcohol.

Carver sat deep in thought for a few moments, his fingers drumming on the side of his glass. ‘The baby. He is with the Jacobsons now?’

Noah nodded. Beth had been taken to the neurological unit of the hospital in the next town. She still hadn’t said a word. No one had told her about Stu. He hadn’t survived the impact.

‘What about other family?’

Noah shrugged. ‘I don’t know. The police are investigating.’

‘I can pull some strings here if need be. I have a contact in the social services. She helps with my students.’

Noah glanced across. ‘You mean she turns a blind eye?’

Carver laughed, a short, sharp sound. ‘I mean that she used to be a student here. She knows how things work and why certain children need more than a mainstream education.’

Noah shuffled in his chair, reluctantly rousing himself. ‘Damn it. I forgot all about my car. I never rang the breakdown service.’ He hoped the change of subject wasn’t as obvious as it had felt.

‘You’re not going anywhere tonight, Noah. I want you under my roof. And your car will still be in the ditch. It can wait until tomorrow before they haul it out. Ella has made you a bed up already. That woman has lived with me long enough to be one step ahead of me.’

Part of Noah wanted to decline, but a bigger part was quite happy to stay and that confused him. He knew this place was a ‘safe-house’, and children who didn’t fit in with what society deemed normal were welcomed here. Carver was an excellent teacher, even if some of his subjects were considered diverse.

‘We’ll see what the morning brings. But I’m telling you now, I want Beth and Gabriel to stay here, at least until I can investigate what you told me.’

‘Do you think they’re in danger?’ Noah licked his dry lips.

‘I’m not jumping to any conclusions until I can rummage around in the farmhouse for myself. Hopefully, Beth will be able to tell us more fairly soon.’

Noah nodded and drained the last of his glass. He hauled himself to his feet and stretched out, his lower backache from his night in the chair slightly muted by the alcohol.

‘Thank you. For helping. I didn’t know who else to turn to.’ He paused, setting his glass down on the table. ‘Sometimes it seems as if I dreamed it all. It’s distant but right there at the forefront of my mind at the same time.’

Carver was silent. Noah wondered what was going through that intelligent, complex mind.

Rapid footsteps sounded outside in the hallway.

‘Noah.’ Carver knelt at the hearth, pushing a half-burnt log to one side with the poker. ‘Not everything can be explained by the knowledge we have. Your faith can help you through this, but you can’t be blind.’

Ella waited at the bottom of the stairs with a mug of hot chocolate in her hand. Noah closed the door and followed her up to the wing which housed the guest bedrooms. She showed him into a simple room with a dark wood double bed. The coverlet and pillows were pale cream and edged with lace. Three silhouette drawings hung above the bed—two men and a woman, their profiles captured for eternity. By the side of the bed was a small, round mahogany table with a single candle in a glass sconce and a leather-bound book.

Noah smiled. Even though the house existed in this century, Carver didn’t want it to forget where it had come from.

He was beyond tired, the kind of weariness where even thinking becomes an effort. He kicked off his wellingtons and sighed. He hadn’t even prayed since this morning. He hoped God would forgive him.

***

Noah awoke to patches of sun playing on his face, and the sound of a radio from another room. He sat bolt upright in bed, and swung his legs to the floor, unsure for a few hazy moments of where he was, and whether he should be somewhere else. The mug of hot chocolate stood, untouched and skinned over, on the table.

There were voices in the corridor. Noah ran his fingers through his hair—it had more spikes than a hedgehog.

‘Father Isaacs?’ It was Ella.

He opened the door and she handed him a pile of clothes, neatly folded. ‘From Mr. Carver,’ she said, neatly avoiding taking too much notice of Noah’s unkempt appearance. ‘He says they should fit, as long as you haven’t been indulging too much in those WI cakes.’ There was a hint of a smile on her lips.

Noah took the bundle and thanked her—yes, he would be fine. Yes, he had slept well. Yes, a cooked breakfast would be wonderful. Yes, half an hour?

He closed the door and made the decision he would have to get an Ella. She was definitely the oil in the machine that ran this household.

Chapter Thirteen

Edward Carver was reading the morning paper when Noah appeared, freshly showered, well fed and dressed in dark grey jeans and a pale lemon sweater. He lowered the paper an inch and grinned. ‘You look nearly the same as you did ten years ago, my friend. Only with better dress sense.’

Noah laughed and glanced down at his feet. ‘Even the loafers fit. Was that good guesswork or perfect planning? Although the yellow is a little extrovert.’ His feet looked strangely casual to his eye and his sweater surely belonged on a younger man.

‘I never forget a detail, or had you forgotten that? And the colour is perfect. All of that black you wear washes you out. Live a little.’ There was a teasing note in Carver’s voice. ‘I assume Ella has worked her magic and you’re ready to get down to work.’

Noah knew it wasn’t a question.

‘I hope you don’t mind, but I took the liberty of arranging to get your car pulled out of the ditch. The garage by the Post Office is going to keep it for you until you can sort out the nitty gritty with the insurance company.’

‘My memory has been refreshed. And my stomach. Ella fed me enough bacon to deplete the pork supplies of the entire county. Thank you, but right now the car isn’t high on my priority list. Have you heard anything about Beth?’

‘Tom Jacobson rang. Apparently, the police were at his door with some family liaison officer. The Jacobsons used to foster, did you know that? So they agreed Gabriel could stay with Tom and Betty for a few days, just until they release Beth from hospital. Physically, they say there isn’t anything wrong with her.’ Carver’s mouth set into a thin line.

‘Relatives?’

‘Both sets of parents deceased. Both Beth and Stu are...were...only children. Once the police go through the personal papers at the farmhouse, the arrangements for Stu can be sorted. Noah, do you think his death was an accident?’

Noah’s muscles tensed. The thought hadn’t crossed his mind, and he didn’t like the way it made him feel. ‘I thought so, until just now.’ He sighed. ‘The outlook for Gabriel doesn’t look good. Beth can’t care for him the way she is.’

‘Which is exactly why I want them both to come and stay here, at least for the short term. Beth can get all the help she needs in order to get better, and Gabriel will be well looked after. Ella has many talents. And I can hire a nanny if needs be. We keep nocturnal hours here anyway, for the most part, so he won’t keep us awake.’

Noah stared out of the bay window at the wintry landscape. A spider’s web hung between two bushes, dusted with frost.

‘If you can arrange that,’ Noah said, ‘I think it’s the best solution. I don’t want Beth and Gabriel farmed out and getting lost in the system.’ He paused. For some unexplained reason, he believed God had placed him at Beth’s door on purpose. He didn’t want any more harm to come to them.

‘I’ll set the wheels in motion. And Noah, I’ll need you too. From what you said about the entity being forced back by your psalm book, I’ll need your input from a religious point of view. I trust your judgement.’

A thundering of steps resounded on the stairs, followed by Ella’s raised, stern voice saying this wasn’t a playground and they well knew there were rules.

Noah raised an eyebrow. ‘I see you’re still playing God in your own house.’

His host laughed out loud, a deep and human sound.

The carriage clock on the table under the window chimed eleven times. Outside, a blackbird perched on a prickly bush, pulling red berries from amidst its thorns. The sun caught a moving car beyond the hedgerows, turning it into gold.

Deep within, something shifted in Noah’s existence—the same shift he had felt when the church had called him. He knew that nothing would be the same again.

Part 2

Chapter Fourteen

The boy sat in the dark, the only light the glare from his laptop screen. Strands of hair fell over his brow and he pushed them away impatiently, his eyes scanning the words quickly.

His bed stood against the window wall and it was there he sat, surrounded by pillows and toast crumbs. Ella would have a lot to say if she knew he had sneaked supper up to his room, but by 10 p.m., she was usually in bed.

Gabriel Davenport had only moved into this room a few weeks previously, and he was still getting used to four square walls and the difference in the quality of light. Before, he’d had a room at the attic level, where his bed had nestled under the sloping eaves. He had loved to lay awake and listen to the sound of the rain pattering on the roof, and the splish-splash of the tiny rivulets running into the lead gutter. But he had outgrown his boyhood room; he needed more space.

The attic bedroom had a single casement window. Sometimes, he liked to crawl out of that window and scramble up onto the moss-strewn roof, to the great chimney, and sit with his back against the bricks, watching the stars. He knew it wasn’t sensible or safe, but no one had ever told him he couldn’t do it. Gabriel was an odd twenty-first century teenager, more at home with a mountain of books than Twitter trends. And who would he tweet anyway? Everyone who was important to him lived under this roof. Apart from Noah. But he visited so often, he wasn’t really a guest anymore.

The light from the hallway shone under his door. Foot shadows paused outside.

‘I’m nearly asleep,’ he said, in what he hoped was a drowsy tone.

‘No, you’re not. You’re online, unless the glare from under the door is extra-terrestrial.’ The door creaked open a little and a bearded head appeared.

‘I just want to finish this last bit of design,’ the boy pleaded, minimising his browser window. ‘I’m helping Ollie.’

‘And Ollie would agree to that, would he?’ The head was having trouble keeping its lips set in a stern line.

‘Without a doubt.’

‘Five minutes, Gabe. And I mean five of my minutes, not the ones where you stretch time. I swear you should study quantum physics.’

Gabe waited until a door clicked further down the hallway. The muted tones of classical music filled the silence gently, as Carver switched on the radio.

Maximising the browser window, he continued where he had left off. The wireless dongle of his 3G Internet connection glared at him with its single red eye. His conscience prodded him. He hated hiding away and browsing in secret, but if Carver found out what sites he had been on, there would be hell to pay.

Growing up in this house was all Gabe had ever known. He’d been surprised when he learned that other kids went to school; school was here for him. He had never needed other children to play with. Noah had tried and given up when Gabe appeared at his heels after a few minutes, saying he was bored.

Over the past few years, however, he had developed a gnawing need to find out what had happened to his birth family. It started off as an itch that flitted into his mind a few times a day, and then took flight. But since then, it had matured into a hungry beast, demanding to be fed more and more.

As close as he was to Carver, he knew bringing up any mention of that winter would result in a quick and clever change of subject. Why? Was it because he thought Gabe was too young to know the truth, or because the truth had never been proven and Gabe knew Carver hated to be beaten?

Gabe realised he had been reading the same paragraph for the last two minutes. He closed the laptop lid. Sleep would come, but his brain was too wired to settle yet. A strange disorientation unrolled itself in his head, as though at some point he had come adrift from the young boy that he was, but he hadn’t quite caught up with the ship of adulthood. It loomed on the horizon, slipping in and out of the fog.

And he didn’t want to dream. Because they were never anything but nightmares.

It would be so much easier to say fuck it and go on pretending everything was fine. When he played his video games, he could be anyone he wanted—and the hero always won. He didn’t want for anything here, so why would he risk rocking the boat, or rather the flimsy vessel he was floating on right now?

Outside, the night was warm and sultry. A soft breeze rustled the tree tops and a fat moon, three days from full, shone down on The Manor like it had done for hundreds of years. Gabe’s eyes grew heavy as the moonlight crept across his bed. The scent of honeysuckle from the twining climber on the wall drifted in through the open window. The flowers glowed in the moonlight, attracting passing insects. In the attic, a family of mice scratched their way along the rafters, searching for food. Gabe’s leg jerked under the covers as he finally gave in to sleep.

But despite the serenity of the night, something was watching.

Chapter Fifteen

It was a Thursday evening in mid-September and the English summer refused to budge. It had dug itself a nice little hole and broken all records for heat index and lack of rainfall. The newspapers were thrilled. It was the perfect subject about which they could wax lyrical one day, and the next create a healthy dose of scaremongering, by informing the great British public about skin cancer and the possibility of water rationing.

They’d eaten supper early because Ella fretted they wouldn’t eat properly if she left before then. She had also left them a cooked ham in the fridge and fussed until Carver had literally marched her to her car.

‘Ella, we can manage for a day without you. I promise we won’t starve. Your sister dislikes me enough already without you being late.’ He pushed her travel bag into the seat beside her. ‘Now, go!’ He emphasised his words by smacking the back of the car as though it were the flank of a small pony.

‘Is this where you order takeout?’ said Noah with a grin, the dust from Ella’s car wheels still hanging over the driveway.

‘What’s takeout?’ Gabe lingered on the brick porch, wearing an expression of feigned innocence. He always caught onto Noah’s sense of humour.

A shaft of evening sun broke through the trees and caught Gabe’s face. He had dark hair and blue eyes, which came from his mother, but there was something about him in this light that made Noah take a mental step backwards. His chin was tilted slightly upwards and, despite his joking, the humour was missing from his eyes.

‘Walk with an old man, Gabe?’ Noah asked. He could feel Carver’s eyes on him, though the curator appeared to be inspecting a rosebush for greenfly.

Gabe jumped down onto the gravel and was by Noah’s side in an instant. ‘Old man? You’ll never be old, just maybe a bit worn around the edges.’

Noah slid an arm around the boy’s slender shoulders. ‘You should see me after the Sunday School annual picnic. There’s only so many under-five’s and sticky teddy bears that any man can suffer. And don’t even get me started on the parents.’

They disappeared around the side of the house, towards the oldest wing, which housed the overflow libraries and underground cellars. Noah could feel Carver’s eyes on them until they rounded the corner.

‘Are you happy here, Gabe?’ Noah decided to cut right to the point. The sun hovered above the tree line, casting long arrows of light as the branches filtered the evening rays.

‘Most of the time.’ Gabe’s brow furrowed.

Noah’s heart quickened. Hadn’t this day always been inevitable? ‘Don’t you ever want to hang out with other kids your age?’

‘I never have, so why would I start now?’

Noah smiled. ‘I’m only checking. I know Carver assumes people never want to leave his hallowed halls but he’s not right all of the time.’

Now it was Gabe’s turn to laugh. ‘I’ll tell him that.’ He paused as a shadow passed overhead. ‘Look, red kites. Wouldn’t it be amazing to soar on the thermals like that?’ Gabe craned his head back and watched the great birds with their huge wingspan soaring above.

‘So your super power would be the ability to fly then?’

‘It would be cool. But I’d take any super power that was on offer.’ He stretched his arms above his head, as though trying to brush his fingers over the feathers. ‘Sometimes it’s just hard, you know?’ His voice tailed off.

‘What’s hard, Gabriel?’

Noah only used the boy’s full name occasionally and he always had Gabe’s full attention when he did.

‘Being the only one here who doesn’t have a direct line to psychic central.’

‘Don’t I count in that?’

‘You’ve got a connection to God. That’s a premium ability.’ Gabe chewed the side of his mouth.

‘I’m not sure I’d call it a super power. More like a calling I can’t ignore. Have you talked to anyone about this?’

‘I mentioned it to Ollie and he said I was being ridiculous. But he can move objects with his mind if he concentrates hard enough. And Olivia has her ability to see the dead before they cross over.’ He paused. ‘And then there’s me, whose only claim to fame is one night with a box of smoke that never went anywhere.’

Noah remained quiet for a while. It was rare for Gabe to say what he was feeling, and this had obviously been brewing for a while. He didn’t reply until he was sure the boy had finished.

‘You’re not defined by that single episode that took place way back when you were a baby. It’s possible that whatever manifested itself in your house was there by pure chance, and was simply waiting to be set free.’

Gabe shrugged and scuffed his shoe under a pebble on the path. ‘I guess. But I want to be here because I can offer something, not because people think I need babysitting.’

‘I’ll have a word with the big guy. Carver that is, not God.’

The quip seemed to break the negative mood Gabe had wandered into. Or it was possible he felt like he had said enough? Whatever it was, Noah wouldn’t dismiss it lightly.

Chapter Sixteen

‘He wants to do what?’ Carver’s voice roared across the library. He was halfway up a shelf ladder when Noah told him about his conversation with Gabe.

‘I don’t think it’s unreasonable. He’s a bright, sensible kid. It would give him something to focus on. He wants to be useful.’ Noah’s eyes scanned the figure on the ladder. From the soft suede of his loafers to the cut of his light summer suit, Carver’s attire was all about detail.

‘Have you heard yourself?’ Carver’s face was slightly flushed. ‘The whole point to bringing him here in the first place was to keep him away from anything that might crawl out of the woodwork.’

‘I know it was. But there’s been nothing on the radar since the night I found him, true? Whatever it was simply vanished. What harm can it do to let him do the legwork for one of the others?’

‘Aha!’ Carver’s fingers closed over the spine of a book. ‘For a man of the cloth, you have a very open mind, Noah Isaacs.’ The steps creaked as he descended.

‘I believe in God. I believe in goodness and the power of prayer. I also am old enough to know there has to be a yin to the yang—and that’s your side of the coin. I have a healthy respect for it.’ Noah studied a knot in the floorboard. It had taken him years to admit that what they did here was valuable.

‘You’re wasted on the church, my friend.’ Carver blew a thin film of dust from the book.

‘Does this mean you’ll include Gabe in part of your research?’ Noah stood firm, ignoring his friend’s attempt to change the subject.

‘I will think about it.’ Carver’s eyes scanned down the index of his prize. Noah didn’t move. ‘My God, yes! Is that what you wanted to hear? I’ll ask Ollie if he can find something mundane for Gabe. He’ll get bored soon enough.’

‘Ask Ollie what?’ The oldest, by six minutes, of the Taverner twins stood in the doorway with a scuffed holdall at his feet.

‘You’ve been promoted.’ Noah jumped in before Carver could change his mind. ‘You now have an assistant for all those little tasks you hate.’

‘I don’t hate any task, actually.’ Ollie grinned, showing a gap between his two front teeth.

‘Are we getting a new student?’ He took off his glasses and breathed on a lens, then rubbed it on his t-shirt.

‘No, not quite.’ Gabe appeared behind him and dug him in the ribs with one finger. ‘You get me!’ Delight filled his voice.

Carver puffed out his cheeks and sighed. ‘I assume you’ve been lurking for a while, Gabriel?’

‘Since Noah came in. I’ve been brought up in this house. If you don’t lurk, you miss all the good stuff.’

Ollie looked perplexed. ‘I don’t have time to lurk.’

‘Neither will Gabriel from now on. Work him hard, Ollie, but only the basics.’

Noah didn’t miss the glance that went between Ollie and Carver. It said more than words.

***

The following day, Ollie Taverner logged into his account at The Manor. Gabriel hovered at his shoulder. Now that the moment was here, he was desperately impatient to get to work—even though he knew he would be kept well away from anything ‘unsafe’. That frustration only grew as Ollie seemed to take forever to go through his various checks.

The older boy stopped and squinted up at his new apprentice. ‘Personal space, Gabe. You’re not helping anyone by perching.’ Ollie turned to his screen and opened up the file he had selected.

Gabe stepped back by about two inches. Since being given the go ahead to help, even if it was only the simple stuff, he had hardly been able to contain his excitement. He owed Noah big time. Ollie would try to baby him, but he meant to learn all he could whilst pretending it was all confusing. If Carver ever found out what he truly wanted to do...Gabe took that thought and slid it behind a closed door in his mind.

‘Okay, this is what I’m working on now.’ Ollie brought up a couple of photos of a kitchen, one that could have come straight from a magazine, and the other where the contents of the cupboards and counter tops were strewn all over the floor. ‘The woman who lives here thinks she has a poltergeist. But we can’t take her word as gospel—lots of people suddenly believe they have one or that their homes are haunted. They see a TV programme about it and go looking for their fifteen minutes of fame. When Carver does his lectures, all kinds of people turn up, and you can bet your bottom dollar that a few days later, our mail account is near to exploding.’

Gabe leaned in closer. ‘But how can you tell from a photo if she’s lying or not?’

‘A keen eye. And mathematics sometimes.’ Ollie laughed at Gabe’s expression. ‘All those hours with your tutor weren’t just for boring you stupid, you know. A lot of people don’t realise we actually have a criteria we can work with. If we suspect there might not be any foul play by the homeowner, we’ll try and wheedle some cash out of Carver and go and take a look for ourselves. That’s where Olivia is now. She’s in Somerset, investigating claims by a farmer that he sees a Roman legion marching through his barn every month.’

‘So, what can I do?’ Gabe clenched his fists. His fingernails cut into the soft flesh of his palms.

‘You can quit vibrating and sit here and study these photos. Use your brain and intuition and tell me whether you think it’s a hoax or not.’ Ollie got out of the chair and Gabe slid in before he had cleared the seat.

‘I need to do some classified stuff for Carver on the other computer, but I’ll have a look at your findings in about half an hour, okay?’

Gabe watched as Ollie fired up the more powerful desktop in the corner of the room. It was no decision of décor; the screen faced the wall to keep any unauthorised eyes from snooping.

That was where Gabe wanted to be. That was where he would find the files that would help him solve the nagging, unanswered questions. There had to be files filled with notes and possible findings somewhere—Carver wouldn’t have kept it all in his head. He was a scientist, and leaving information for those who would follow him had to be ingrained in his every pore.

Both Carver and Noah had told him long ago that what had happened to Gabe had simply been a random, otherworldly experience. But what tugged at the corners of his mind was the fact that whatever it had been, it was still out there. And he meant to find it.

Chapter Seventeen

Beth Davenport stared out of her bedroom window, to the lawn and the fields beyond. It was late summer and swallows darted in and out of the eaves, raising their last brood of the season. A sudden rambling warble of trills sounded as one of the parent birds came home with a beak filled with evening insects. She liked birds and the freedom they had to come and go as they pleased.

The sky held a candy floss pink moon, a whisper from full, though night still waited in the wings. The promise of another night followed by another day. But time didn’t mean anything to her. She didn’t have any memory of anything but living in this room, this house; although sometimes, an image pushed itself out from the thick mist that carpeted her mind. She shied away from these unwelcome disturbances. They made her feel nervous, and when she got like that, she did silly things. At least Ella said they were silly things. Beth had no concept of silly or serious.

Sometimes one of the men came to see her. Reverend Isaacs was one. He and the other man used to ask her questions, or at least she thought they did. She didn’t like questions—they made her head ache. Then, Ella would come and make her lie down. A boy came too sometimes, but not with the men. He would sit with her and look out of the window. He understood that the birds made her happy. And he didn’t move the chairs—she didn’t like anyone moving the furniture.

The boy said his name was Gabriel. It was a pretty name. If she ever had a baby, she hoped she would give it a pretty name. But where did you get babies? She had tried to remember once. Ella had found her in the wardrobe at suppertime, curled up in a corner. But she’d only gone in to see if babies came from there.

Her once dark hair was winter white. Strands had appeared the day Noah brought her to The Manor and before a year was out, only a few dark wisps remained.

In the beginning, they had brought her downstairs for meals, had included her in conversations even though she didn’t answer. That was before one of the former students, thinking he was helping out, had tried to light a fire in the parlour hearth with green wood. Smoke had engulfed the room quickly. Beth had been cautiously walking down the stairs when the tendrils of smoke drifted into the hallway. It had taken Carver and Ella nearly an hour to stop her screaming. That was when she had first seen the boy cry.

Now they asked her if she wanted to go downstairs or outside. The boy brought her books from the library with brightly coloured photographs—parrots with jewelled plumage in the Amazon rain forests, crowds of pale pink flamingos with graceful necks in an ocean the colour of a Utah sky. Beth knew they must be make-believe. Her world ended at the boundaries of The Manor.

In winter, sometimes they moved her to a different room, one without a window. She didn’t like that too much as she couldn’t see the birds. They told her it was because it might snow. Snow was a bad word. It had crept in with its icy fingers like a thief in the night and had stolen all her memories of Before.

She sighed, a soft exhalation of breath, which misted the window for a moment. Then, it was gone. Sometimes, she wished that she could disappear as easily.

Chapter Eighteen

Downstairs, Carver waited until the house had gone to sleep.

He had spent a restless day unable to settle on any task. This irked him more than he was willing to admit.

Over the last year, Gabe seemed to have taken a much keener interest in what went on in the house behind closed doors. Not that Carver had kept it secret; you couldn’t expect a child who was brought up in this environment not to be curious. But in the past, Gabe had been happy with getting answers to his questions, and then wandering off to play his video games. It had been a lot easier when Gabe was younger. He had always been an inquisitive child, full of questions and statements such as I think I should be allowed to eat all the cake because I’m never sick. Carver had never treated him as a child, probably because on some cellular level, Gabe hadn’t seemed like a child. He was brought up in a house full of adults, so he became a small adult.

He was, in short, an old soul.

Noah was the one who had noticed the change. He drove up every couple of days, whenever church life gave him a few hours spare. The bond between them was strong. Noah always seemed to have the knack of smoothing over any of Gabe’s ruffled feathers if Carver had come down on him too strictly.

Ollie checked in with him before supper to say Gabe had buckled down to the task he’d been given, without complaint. He had asked the right questions and come up with the right answers. Gabe would be a real help, Ollie continued, as Carver sat with one foot resting on his knee and what he hoped was an unreadable expression in his eyes.

After bidding Ollie goodnight, Carver sat in the same position, swivelling his chair as though the mere action would bring about some resolution to the doubts in his mind. He would have rather Ollie said Gabe was bored, or too irritating. The fact he had settled into the task as though he was born to it only increased Carver’s uneasiness.

There were certain things Gabe didn’t know. Things Carver didn’t ever want him to know. But recently, he had seen a thirst for knowledge in Gabe’s eyes, a hunger waiting to immerse itself in all of the dark workings of the house. If he was honest with himself, Carver was afraid Gabe might come too close to the truth.

He booted up his laptop and signed on to the network. Part of him hated the fact he was checking up on a boy who had never lied to him. Not that Gabe was submissive—far from it. He could argue a point if he believed he was right and Carver respected him for that. He opened up the browsing history for the day. His eyes scanned the list quickly. There was nothing that didn’t relate to the poltergeist incident Ollie had given him. A rush of both relief and guilt flooded through him as he closed the laptop lid. I want to protect him, he thought, but if I deny him his wish to be a more active member of the house, I might force him away. I can’t track his movements night and day, so where does that leave me?

Noah’s voice chastised him in his head. Trust. It was so easy to say, but when there was a figurative time bomb in the house, it made him wish that he could turn back the clock.

Chapter Nineteen

In another house, Noah Isaacs was also awake. But only just.

He groped for his mobile, which was vibrating like an angry wasp on his nightstand. He registered the caller with a bleary eye and sat up in bed.

‘Tom? Is everything okay?’ Noah’s first thought was that Betty had gone missing again. Over the past few years, dementia had set in, and Tom’s firecracker of a wife had turned into a shadow of herself. She was prone to wandering off ‘to feed the chickens’ and getting hopelessly lost.

‘Betty’s fine, if that’s what you mean,’ Tom answered. ‘And don’t you go telling me to get anyone in to help. I can manage.’

Noah didn’t have time to reply before Tom continued. ‘I thought you’d want to know that Beth’s farmhouse is burning. I smelled smoke earlier when I was checking the pigs, but I thought it was someone burning garden waste. I got woken up by two fire engines racing down the lane with their sirens blaring. Got myself dressed to take a look. You can see the flames from the cattle yard. I reckon the thatch caught light.’

Noah scrambled out of bed and pulled his curtain back. In the distance, at the far side of the cemetery, yellow flames licked the night sky, interspersed by the blue neon flash of the fire engine lights.

‘Is anyone inside?’ Concern brought his mind into sharp focus.

‘I don’t think so. The people who bought it after Beth left are often away. It’s more of a holiday retreat.’ The disgust the old farmer felt at this state of affairs was evident in his voice.

‘I’m going to drive down and see if I can help.’ Noah tucked the phone under his chin as he pushed one leg into a pair of jeans slung over a chair.

‘I thought that’s what you’d say. That’s why I’m outside in the Land Rover. Be quick.’

The smell of smoke hit Noah as soon as he opened the front door. A strong breeze stirred the canopy of the old elms in the graveyard. He grimaced. That wouldn’t help with tackling the fire.

Tom sat, stony faced, behind the wheel of his battered, green farm vehicle as they sped the short distance to the lane. The fire engines had been joined by a police car, but no ambulance. Noah muttered a short prayer of thanks as he jumped out.

‘Reverend. Tom.’ A stout man dressed in uniform nodded a greeting.

‘Andrew.’ Noah held out a hand but the other man had already turned back to the raging fire. Inside the house came the sound of cracking timbers. Its bones are breaking, he thought, and shivered, despite the heat.

‘Sorry business this.’ Andrew Linton said. ‘The fire chief says it had a hold before they arrived. These old cottages are just tinderboxes waiting to go up, and we haven’t had rain for weeks. This place though, seems to be cursed.’

Noah glanced across at Tom. His lips were set tight.

‘Are we sure there was no one inside?’ asked Noah.

A torrent of sparks shot into the air as something inside the house exploded.

‘Constable Cooper checked with the neighbourhood watch liaison. The owners are in Leningrad on business. They left a key at the station in case the alarm went off. As it often does.’ Andrew Linton stood back as two fire officers pulled another huge hose from the engine.

‘It will be a sorry shame to see this in daylight.’

Tom broached a question Noah hadn’t even thought of. ‘Was it arson?’

Linton shrugged. ‘Too early to tell. The fire bods will have to sift around once it’s all cooled down.’

The acrid smell of smoke clung to the inside of Noah’s nose, coating his throat with what felt like tar. He drew out a white handkerchief from his pocket and covered his mouth. Smoke was no longer simply a by-product of a burning object, not anymore.

Over the top of the hedges, headlights cut through the darkness. Whoever it was would have to back track as the fire engines blocked the narrow country lane. The car rounded the bend on the wrong side of the road and braked sharply. A young woman climbed out, long brown hair loose around her shoulders. Noah turned at the sound of her voice.

‘Olivia.’ Noah smiled a welcome as Ollie’s twin sister appeared at his shoulder.

‘Hi, Noah,’ she replied. ‘I just got back and saw the flames. You can see them from the other side of the village. I thought I’d come and join the party.’

One side of Tom’s upper lip tightened upward.

Olivia Taverner was younger than her brother by six minutes. She had the same slightly aquiline nose and brown eyes, but their similarities ended there. Ollie was studious, quiet and mainly unflappable; Olivia was ambitious, impatient and prone to flying off the handle if riled. Historically, she should have been the boy. Tom didn’t care for her much and didn’t hide it, but she respected him for having an opinion. Not that it stopped her from saying exactly what she felt.

Olivia had arrived at The Manor with her brother four years ago, and from their first meeting had refused to acknowledge Noah’s religious title. This had been the cause of her first fiery argument with Carver, who insisted new students follow etiquette until they settled in. In that moment, everyone in the house realised that if she stayed, life was going to get a whole lot louder. Carver gave his students a three-month probation period. After that, if they—or he—decided it wasn’t a good fit, everyone could go their separate ways. Despite the raised voices and slamming doors, Carver quickly understood Olivia had a unique gift. She couldn’t control it well, and had spent her whole life running from it. The Manor was a last-ditch attempt at help by parents so frazzled by their children’s talents that they were willing to try anything.

Carver ran a more traditional business certification alongside the other classes intended to help students hone their craft. But his students never had to fall back on the business idea. It was a smokescreen, a failsafe meant for the day someone came to him and failed. But Carver knew that no one failed. If they stayed, it was because they were all gifted, sent to him as the product of an educational system which believed that anyone could fit into neatly defined compartments. Over the years, many had passed through the doors, and many had gone on to other private ‘institutions’, well versed and confident in their talents.

Olivia watched silently, the glow from the flames reflected in her pale face.

‘There’s no one in there,’ she said, and Noah wondered how she could be so sure. He wiped his mouth with his now grimy handkerchief. Carver said that she could see the dead, the ones who hadn’t yet crossed fully over. Noah had no reason to disbelieve, but it still shook him to the core if he dwelt on it too much.

Olivia suddenly turned and went back to her car with no farewell greeting. The crunch of tyres sounded against the gravel as she reversed, and the engine roared as she put her foot down on the accelerator of her blue Mini.

‘That girl needs a strong man to leash some of that attitude,’ said Tom, spitting on the road.

Noah thought it would take someone with the patience of a saint to put up with her outbursts, and saints were in short supply in the twenty-first century. ‘She’s young and hot-headed, Tom. Give her a few years, she might settle down.’

A short, terse laugh erupted from the old farmer. ‘If I was a betting man, Reverend, I’d hold you to a wager.’

‘I’m heading back to the station. There’s nothing more I can do here. I’ve got paperwork to start,’ said Linton, sighing.

‘I think we’re done too. You want a lift back?’ said Tom, already walking to his Land Rover.

Noah followed, really wishing he had a little bit of Olivia’s pushiness. He was too much of a soft touch.

Chapter Twenty

Olivia Taverner pulled up outside the pointed arch doorway of The Manor. Two coach lanterns on either side of the stonework welcomed her home.

The house slumbered under a sky slightly fogged from the grey smoke drifting over the fields. She climbed out of her car and eased her shoulders back. The drive home from Somerset had been one continuous stop-and-start with road works and minor accidents.

The phantom Roman legion had proved to be a dud. After exhaustive tests and interviews with the old man, she had dismissed the case. He had not been pleased by her attitude. Had she called him a time-waster? No, not to his face. But that’s what he was. Conveniently, his claims of soldiers marching through his barn had come about the same time as he’d finished converting an old stable block into two holiday cottages. No doubt he thought a ghost army would appeal to any tourists who passed by. The area was a popular ghost-hunting track, and close to Glastonbury. Though Olivia was getting quite a reputation in the area as the girl who didn’t take any bullshit, that didn’t stop people from trying.

She hadn’t wanted to take on the case to begin with, but Carver had insisted she go, telling her every claim must be taken on its merit. He said it might widen her skills. She’d insisted that her dead were very fresh, hardly cold in fact, and she doubted a Roman army came under that heading.

Physically, she was exhausted but her brain refused to accept that as an excuse. She had lied to Noah about just getting back. She had arrived a little after nine and parked out of the way on the other side of the village by the local infant school. Using the bridleways as a cut through, she made her way across the newly harvested fields, vaulting over the wooden stile, which led to the lane. Beth’s old farmhouse roof was soon in view. As far as she could tell, no one had seen her. She often walked this way, preferring the quiet to the bustle in the village. Her idea of hell was being caught up in small talk from people she didn’t even know.

The quaint farm cottage stood back from the road. Its present owners had fitted a new door and painted the woodwork Farrow and Ball pale blue. Lavender pots framed the entrance. Pretty and compact and quintessentially English.

But it had always had an air of malevolence to Olivia, like a beautiful girl who kept butterflies in a jar.

She knew its history, of course. Who couldn’t, living under the same roof as Beth and Gabe? And she liked Gabe, even though he could be annoying in a little brother kind of way. But she tried to keep out of Beth’s way. Sometimes she felt as if there was far more going on inside Beth’s head than the others realized.

It had been an incredibly long day. Olivia slid her key into the lock and pushed open the door. A soft glow from the lamp on the console table upstairs interrupted the darkness, but all was silent—that special type of night quiet that never happens in daylight. She counted the steps as she went up, avoiding number six and number thirteen because they creaked like old bones. Pausing outside her brother’s door, she rested her knuckles on the wood then thought better of it. It would be best to keep the secret to herself.

Her room was at the end of the corridor. She tossed her bag onto the bed and pulled down the window blind. She couldn’t shift the smell of smoke; it was clung to her hair. But time enough for a shower in the morning. A dull throb had started above her right eye and all that would fix that was sleep. Without taking off her clothes, she lay down on the bed and closed her eyes.

Her dreams were fitful, filled with fire.

Chapter Twenty-One

Carver told Gabe the news about his old home over breakfast. Noah had rung first thing.

It was rare for the boy to be up and about much before 10 a.m. He was, like most of the house, a night owl. But there was a certain determination about him that made Carver glance sideways more than once as Gabe spread an unhealthy amount of jam on a slice of toast. A slight furrow appeared between his brows before answering. He’s choosing his words carefully, Carver thought.

‘I’m fine about it, honestly,’ he mumbled through a mouthful of crumbs. ‘It’s not as if I remember living there.’

Carver folded his newspaper on the table and cradled a mug of tea in his hands.

‘I realise that but it’s where—’

‘Where I was before everything got fucked up.’ Gabe’s interruption startled the older man a little but he continued to sip his tea. The boy might say he was fine, but underneath it was all still raw, if poked.

‘Can I write up my findings on the poltergeist study this morning? Ollie said he had to go into town, but I want to do it whilst it’s fresh in my mind.’

Carver couldn’t find fault with that statement even though an irrational part of his brain pitched a hissy fit about Gabe having access by himself. But really, what harm could he do? All the classified files were on lock-down.

‘Okay, do that. Can you bring me a copy when you’re finished? I’d like to see what you came up with.’

‘Best get on with it then.’ Gabe gulped down half a glass of orange juice and took his toast with him as he left.

Carver sat for a few minutes, his hands clasped on the table. He stared at the pattern in the tablecloth without registering what it was. Gabe had taken it all too well.

But he had other worries to deal with. Beth should hear it from him about the house. He didn’t want her finding out accidentally and risk upsetting her. But did she even remember her old place? Some days she hardly seemed to be awake inside her own skin.

Her door was closed, as always. He rapped gently. ‘Beth, it’s Carver. Can I come in and have a few words?’ Usually at this point, there would be movement from within and occasionally, she would open it herself and peek out like a startled bunny. Silence. He tried again, this time knocking a little harder. ‘Beth?’

A door opened, but it was behind him. Olivia stood in the corridor with her hair damp from the shower.

‘Beth!’ This time, there was a note of alarm in his voice.

He grasped the doorknob and pushed, his eyes sweeping the room.

‘Is she okay?’ asked Olivia, close behind him.

He turned and thought he could physically feel the blood draining from his face.

‘She’s not here.’

Chapter Twenty-Two

Beth Davenport stood in front of what was once her old home.

A surprise late-summer drizzle fell from a cloud-scudded sky, and the air was filled with the after smell of stale smoke. Beth didn’t like that smell. Charred timbers poked forlornly through what had once been the roof, stretching blackened fingers to the sky. Flakes of grey powder, stirred by the breeze, floated over the debris. Blistered paint peeled from the woodwork. She touched a bubble with her finger and it disintegrated beneath her touch.

She didn’t know how she had got here. It had all started last night as dusk fell. The swallows were performing for her, a special dance only she could delight in. She remembered pressing her palms against the glass, wanting to join in, wanting to fly. Something bright had caught her eye on the lawn below. A parade of orange lions. They were marching with their tails held high, circling the ornamental fountain at the far end of the garden.

That’s when she heard the baby cry. She had tried to forget about it. She had curled up in the corner by her bed with her hands over her ears, but she could still hear it. She had fallen asleep but the plaintive distressing sound seemed to slice through her like a shard of glass. Why did no one else go and comfort it? Finally, just before dawn, she could bear it no longer.

She didn’t want to leave her room, but she had to find the baby. It didn’t occur to her to ask for help. Her mind locked down on one task. She followed the sound of the cries. They seemed to be from a room downstairs. She crept down with her back to the wall, sliding her open palms against the painted surface to steady herself.

Now the cries came from outside. Alongside the baby’s cries, her own heartbeat thudded in her ears.

For the first time in fifteen years, she had opened the door and stepped outside.

She stared at her feet. Her blue suede slippers were wet. A buttercup glowed bright yellow against the stark, ash-strewn ground. She dropped to her knees, fingering the satin petals. They felt like...like...baby skin. That’s how she had got here—following the baby cries. But now those cries had stopped, and she didn’t know what to do.

She shivered, a thin woman with dark blue eyes too big for her pale face. A single tear fell from her right eye, leaving a pathway on her dusty cheek.

***

Two miles away, Carver sat beside Olivia, both of them grim faced. Her white-knuckled fingers clutched the steering wheel. The Mini clung to the sharp bends, its tyres squealing in protest. Carver prayed they wouldn’t meet anything coming the other way. They had both left the house at a run, jumping into Olivia’s car. They were through the gate before he had a chance to think about Gabe. Maybe it was better he didn’t know, not yet anyway.

There was only one place he could think of that Beth might have gone. He tried not to think about the narrow lanes and speeding cars that didn’t expect to see anyone walking on the roads. Olivia turned left onto the lane, barely glancing in the other direction. Even after four years, Carver had never quite managed to scale the wall she hid behind, and no onslaught by him had been able to bring it down.

‘If she’s here, she won’t go inside, will she?’ Olivia’s voice remained level as they rounded the last bend before the farmhouse.

Carver didn’t answer. He searched for the gap between the hawthorn hedges where the gate stood.

He was out of the car before Olivia had come to a halt. His feet skidded on the gravel-strewn road. The fire engines had chewed up great swathes of verge and scattered stones across the surface.

‘There! There she is!’ His legs turned to jelly. ‘Beth!’

She turned and lifted her hand in a small wave. He pushed open the gate, flakes of charred wood smearing his hands.

‘Beth, thank God.’ He wrapped his arms around her slender shoulders and hugged her fragile body but she didn’t respond. Her gaze lingered on the burnt out cottage.

‘Do you hear the baby crying?’ she asked as her brow creased. It was speckled in ash. ‘I don’t hear it anymore.’

Olivia stood at the gate, her eyes gliding over the fire-ruined building. For a few seconds, Carver thought he saw a strangeness in her, a vulnerability poking its way through her barbed surface.

Beth turned to Olivia and smiled, before returning her gaze to the remains of the house.

‘Can we go see him? He’s been waiting a long time.’ She lifted her face to look at Carver and tugged at his arm. Her eyes shone. For the first time in fifteen years, she seemed alive.

Carver stared into the depths of the farmhouse, afraid of what he might see, but there was nothing but a broken wooden skeleton and burnt offerings. He took Beth’s arm gently, wanting to lead her away, not quite sure if being here was good for her or not.

Her face fell but she let him walk her to the gate.

‘You see him too, don’t you?’ Beth asked, turning to Olivia.

Olivia’s eyes widened, her answer a whisper.

He spun round as his heart leapt into his throat.

‘Do you know him, Beth?’

‘Of course I do. It’s Stu.’

Chapter Twenty-Three

Gabe found himself in an empty house. He couldn’t believe his luck.

He knew Carver hadn’t wanted to agree to him being in the research study without Ollie, but Gabe had phrased it in such a way that it would have been difficult for him to refuse. An edge of guilt prodded Gabe in the ribs. He loved Carver like you would love a pet dragon—with great affection, but carefully.

Even though he knew he was alone, he couldn’t settle until he had toured the house— opening doors and calling out hellos that sounded strange in an empty place. Olivia’s car had disappeared, so maybe she and Carver had gone on an assignment. It was a bit weird nobody had said goodbye though.

The remains of his toast and jam and the hurriedly swallowed juice churned in Gabe’s stomach. Now that his plan could finally be put in motion, part of him wondered if it was such a good idea. He was going to rock his little life raft and there might be sharks just waiting. He pushed the mental image aside. But he knew why. What had happened to Beth couldn’t have been a random event. He had a gut feeling the answer lay not too far away, in the vault under the old wing, the one place he wasn’t allowed to go. Carver kept hard copies of all his cases down there, preferring the security of a steel-clad room to anything Cloud-based.

Finding the password to Ollie’s computer had seemed the only way. There must be files, probably hidden, where he could find some crumbs of information to help him slot together the pieces. But he never dreamed he would have the opportunity to visit the vault. There was always someone in the house with him.

The oldest and original wing of the house dated back to Tudor times. There were even rumours Henry VIII had kept one of his mistresses here. Where the vault now stood was probably a cold store then, although when Gabe was small, he was sure it was a dungeon—even the thought of it brought goosebumps up on his arms. Now those same goosebumps crawled across his skin.

He crossed the main hall, skirting the kitchen and utility areas and leaving the parlour at his back. Down a stone set of stairs and through a small door where he had to duck to avoid smashing his head on the top, then down another longer flight of stairs. The lower he went, the damper and colder it got. Water dripped through the earth ceiling and the course of the river rumbled as it flowed past the west side of the grounds. Gabe had wondered why Carver chose to build his vault where he did, but Ollie had told him that it didn’t matter what the temperature was like underground because the vault was thermostatically controlled.

A noise rose out of the dark. It was a faint skittering.

The hair on the nape of his neck prickled. He paused, his breath caught tight in his throat, like a fox in a trap. The light switch was at the bottom of the stairs. He cursed. Why the hell didn’t he bring a torch? Cautiously, he forced his feet ahead into the blackness, his ears tuned to every single sound. Somewhere close, water dripped. A cold draught touched his face and he reached out, fingers sliding down the slick stone walls until he found the toggle for the light. He flicked it on.

A fluorescent bar hummed to life on the ceiling, closely followed by another at the end where the wall curved round to the now defunct coal cellar.

The vault door stood between them, a great imposing steel box designed to be a storm shelter in tornado alley. Carver had had it imported from the US. On the right hand side, an electronic swipe pad glowed pale green in the dim light.

Gabe’s heart plummeted. What had he expected, a normal door with a handle? Disappointment unfurled in his gut like a venomous snake.

‘Gabe?’ A voice split the silence from above. ‘What are you doing down here?’

Gabe spun round, a rush of heat rising to his face.

Ollie stood at the top of the stairs and he didn’t look happy.

Chapter Twenty-Four

Noah Isaacs arrived at The Manor a little after 11 a.m. He had been outside, talking to a parishioner about the arrangements for a funeral, and had missed Carver’s phone call. A text message followed, simply stating: Can you come over? Noah hadn’t wasted any time. Edward Carver didn’t do texts; he called them a lazy abomination, for him to send one could only mean trouble.

Noah tried to stop his mind from imagining what it could be. Increasingly, he had found his brain dwelling on the affairs of The Manor instead of affairs of the church. Guilt plagued him when he went to pray. And the fire last night had unsettled him more than he thought it should.

Carver said to meet him here, but there were no cars outside, only Ollie’s bicycle leaning against the wooden bench by the rose bushes. Noah caught a waft of scent as he ran up the steps. It was strange not being met by Ella, but Carver had insisted she stay at her sister’s for longer if she wanted to. He had a sudden mental image of The Manor as an old watch filled with cogs and springs and without Ella, it all pinged apart.

Noah hesitated, then pushed open the front door and stood a little self-consciously in the hallway. The tick-tock of the grandfather clock seemed louder today, as though making up for the lack of other noise. Shafts of sunlight from the high window at the top of the stairs patterned the walls. From the bowels of the house came the shutting of doors and muffled voices. He called out a hello and the voices stalled, then responded.

‘Hi, Reverend,’ Ollie came into view, closely followed by a sheepish-looking Gabe. ‘If you’re here for the boss man, he’s out. Not quite sure where.’ Ollie’s voice seemed unnaturally bright. Gabe stared at the floor.

‘He wanted me to meet him here. I got a text.’

Ollie’s eyebrows shot up. ‘You had better frame that one. I didn’t think his phone had a message app.’

Noah studied the two boys as he hung his jacket on the coat stand. There was something odd about the way they were trying to act like everything was normal. They were keeping a secret. And this house had too many of those.

The low thrum of an engine and the crunch of gravel interrupted the slightly awkward silence in the hallway. The glass panels on either side of the door filled with blue as Olivia’s car pulled up.

Noah’s jaw dropped as he opened the door. Carver tipped the passenger seat up to help Beth from the back. Olivia sat clasping the wheel with her forehead resting on her hands.

‘Liv?’ Ollie pushed his way past and ran to the car. He pulled open the door and knelt by the sill.

‘Beth’s cold, we need to get her inside...’ Carver’s voice tailed off as he met Noah’s gaze. His usual, brisk air had deflated like a discarded balloon.

In Noah’s gut, an old dread stirred. He found himself pushed out of the way again as Gabe shot out of the door. There was a moment when he thought Gabe might hug Beth, but instead he took her hand in his. Her dark eyes stared into space.

‘Gabe, can you take Beth upstairs and find her something warmer to wear? I’ll take questions after she’s comfortable.’

Gabe looked as if he was going to object to Carver’s request, but he clammed up and led his mother into the house.

Noah’s jaw ached. He realised he had been clenching his teeth.

‘Noah, can you make tea? Or bring brandy. I don’t care which.’ Carver turned his attention to Ollie, who was helping his sister out of the car.

‘Ollie, take Olivia into the parlour. Don’t leave her side. I need to talk to you all before Gabe comes downstairs.’

Noah leant against the doorframe. Things seemed to be moving unnaturally, as if in another orbit. He was right to have felt an undercurrent of foreboding as he drove here.

Carver paused, waiting for Ollie to take his twin into the parlour. Strong sunlight filtered through the bay window, highlighting dust motes that floated through the air like tiny gold flakes, the worn leather on the wing-back chairs, the browned edges on the leaves of the aspidistra. The room suddenly looked tired as if it had wanted to die decades ago, but had been made to continue on into another century that it didn’t understand.

Carver ran his finger over his lower lip, pressing it against his teeth. ‘Noah, I think we might be in trouble again.’

Chapter Twenty-Five

Olivia Taverner lowered herself onto the leather couch opposite the hearth. It was a simple task, but her brain-to-body communication had all but ceased.

Her brother, his face pale and drawn, knelt by her side. She didn’t remember how she’d got here from the farmhouse. Autopilot had kicked in. Shock soaked through her, chilling her to the bone. She had wanted to say that she hadn’t seen the man, had wanted to dismiss him as a trick of the light. Fear crept into her veins and froze. Olivia saw dead people, but people who had died recently, who hadn’t found their way to the crossing. Her first thought was that he must have been inside the house when it was alight. But that was impossible.

She wasn’t sure if it was that relief that had caused her to admit that she saw him, too. But Beth’s husband had been dead for fifteen years. Why was he still in spirit and why choose now to make an entrance?

Beth hadn’t been fazed at all. Olivia had been more than surprised that Beth understood about her gift, but it reinforced the little twinge she’d always had. The one telling her that, while the woman might be away with the fairies most of the time, she was highly intuitive.

Noah and Carver spoke in the hallway, in hushed tones.

Laughter drifted down from upstairs. Beth—the woman who had barely uttered a word in the four years since Olivia had been here—was laughing. Ollie squeezed her fingers, his eyes full of questions. It was broad daylight, and the sun was trying its best to convince the world it was still high summer. But Olivia felt as if the shutters had been drawn on what she knew and cracked open on what waited in the dark recesses of imagination.

She had always been afraid of her own gift, whereas Ollie had delighted in his ability to be able to move objects even the tiniest distance. They had grown up in care, the system placing them with various foster families who were overjoyed to nurture twins. Until odd things started to happen. A particular birthday party for their reception classmates had ended with terrified parents scooping up their offspring and dashing for the door, after Ollie had made his jelly rise up from the table. A few weeks later, Olivia was found huddled in a corner of her bedroom, clutching her teddy bear and obviously upset. When questioned, she had said she didn’t like the lady in the corner with the blue tongue. Her foster parents were wakened in the middle of that same night by the rotating blue flash of an ambulance light. The woman opposite had been found strangled in her kitchen. The twins were back in care within a month.

Ollie rarely used his talent now, and she wondered if he practised it sometimes out of sight.

Carver came into the room and stood by the window. He hadn’t talked much to her about what she had seen. But she knew by the set of his jaw there was as much swirling about his mind as within her own.

‘What the hell is going on?’ Ollie half raised himself and sat on the sofa arm, his hand on his sister’s shoulder.

‘Wait for Noah,’ Carver answered. Ollie opened his mouth to speak but Olivia quietened him with a glance.

They could all hear the sounds from the kitchen, the shushing noise as the kettle began to boil, the opening of cupboard doors and the clink of earthenware on the table. Normal sounds. Let’s make tea, it solves everything. Olivia gritted her teeth.

After what seemed like an eternity, Noah came through, carrying a tray full of mugs and a packet of ginger biscuits. He set the tray on the table as Gabe appeared. Carver sighed, a tiny exhale of breath.

‘She’s sleeping,’ Gabe said, to no one in particular. ‘But she’s happy, like really happy. What happened out there?’ This last was to Carver.

***

How much to say?

Carver looked at the expectant faces, all with their gazes firmly fixed on him. Usually, he revelled in these moments. He was a true patriarch and lived for the times when his family were close and awaiting whatever pearls of wisdom tripped from his tongue. But this was different. Part of him knew this day would come, even after all of this time. His old mentor had once told him nothing supernatural happens at random. It always has an agenda, be it in another week or another hundred years.

‘Beth wasn’t in her room when I checked this morning. We found her at the farmhouse.’ He squeezed Gabe’s shoulder. ‘Hear me out, Gabriel. You can ask any questions you want afterwards.’ The boy threw his hands up in frustration but kept quiet.

‘She was fine, animated, if anything. She told us that she heard a baby cry.’ Noah’s eyes met Gabe’s. ‘Then she asked Olivia if she could see the man inside the wreckage.’

Carver kept his eyes fixed on Gabe. He had said he was okay about the fire at breakfast, but that was clearly not the case now. His shoulders trembled and his blue eyes darkened with anger.

Noah grabbed his arm. ‘Please Gabe, a few minutes.’

‘Beth said the man was your father, Gabe. And yes, I saw him too,’ said Olivia quietly. Any qualms Carver might have had about not telling Gabriel that part were stamped on. This was the kind of day where tact had decided to stay in bed.

The colour drained from Gabe’s face.

Noah reached for a mug of coffee and handed it to him. ‘Drink this. And yes, it has a healthy dose of brandy in it. I don’t think this is the time to start worrying about alcohol.’

Gabe grasped it in two hands, his fingers curling tight around it as though it could save him.

‘Does this mean we should be on high alert?’ said Ollie. His usual studious expression had been replaced by a quieter, somehow older, mask.

‘We should always be on alert, all of us.’ Carver’s gaze swept the room again. ‘I don’t know why Stu should choose now to materialise, but we can’t ignore it.’

‘I might know why.’ Olivia pulled the cushion out from behind her back and hugged it to her chest. ‘The fire, it wasn’t an accident. I set it.’

A tangible shock wave reverberated around the room.

Gabe dropped his mug. It fell to the floor, its contents puddling on the worn, red rug.

‘What gave you the right to do that?’ Gabe clenched his fists by his side. Although his voice was quiet, anger hung on every word.

‘Gabriel...’ Noah held out his hand.

‘Don’t, just don’t!’ Gabe spun round. His dark eyes flashed.

‘I had a reason, let me explain.’ Olivia tried to intervene, but the look Gabe gave her would have withered a lesser mortal.

Carver’s orderly world tipped off its axis.

‘I don’t want to hear it. Do you realise what you’ve done?’ He was a few feet away from her now, not caring what flew out of his mouth, consumed by hurt and disbelief. ‘You took away the only thing I had left that was normal. The only place where my family was happy.’

He strode from the room, slamming the door behind him. Olivia flinched and Ollie’s frown deepened.

‘Leave him to digest it all,’ said Carver. ‘It’s all been a huge shock. I didn’t quite envisage everything being put on the table like this. But now it’s out in the open, we have to deal with it.’ He took a mug from the tray and gulped the contents.

‘Miss Taverner,’ he focused his attention on the girl barricading herself behind the cushion. ‘You had better have an excellent reason for setting that fire.’

Chapter Twenty-Six

Hot, angry tears welled up in Gabe’s eyes. He knew he was acting like a child, but that didn’t stop them. He thumped up the stairs and into his room, shutting the door with such force that his windows rattled. He hadn’t meant to lash out at Olivia, or maybe he had, things had suddenly gone into free-fall and he didn’t have a parachute.

Ollie’s questions in the vault had been cut short. The echo of Noah’s car running over the cattle grid on the narrow track outside The Manor announced his arrival, in just time enough for them both to get to the main house. Gabe could still feel his cheeks burning as he followed Ollie up the stone steps. He had no answer that would possibly get him out of this pit he had dug for himself. It had all seemed so easy in his mind. He would discover what had really happened when he was a baby, and Carver, Noah, and the rest of the house would be amazed at his determination and sheer brilliance. They would all live together happily and he would find a cure to bring Beth out from her twilight world.

He threw himself face down on the bed and let the pillow soak up his tears. How could he face everyone again? Ever since he was little, Carver had reinforced the golden rule that the house ran on teamwork. He should have listened to what Olivia had to say, and then laid into her if the explanation was pathetic. The reasoning side of his brain was trying very hard to gain the winning hand, but deep down, he was seething. He let the dark, viscous thoughts churn to the surface and bit into his pillow.

For a long time, he had mulled over why his family had been targeted by evil. But any leads had come to a grinding halt with his mother’s descent into her own make-believe world. Mother. Gabe had never called her that, only in his mind as they sat gazing out of the window. She didn’t know who he was and that fact cut so deep into his heart, it might as well have been carved in two. Two separate chambers: one ruling his everyday tasks and how he let others perceive him, and one that hid, encased in ice and rarely thawed.

Years ago, he had overheard Ella talking to her sister on the phone. ‘It was heart breaking, the way the poor mite squirmed to get out of Beth’s arms. As if he knew she was changed.’

The only clue was the wooden box Noah had found when the snow finally melted. Upended on the lawn and looking sorry for itself, the hinges rusted solid and the varnish peeling away from its lid. Carver said he had investigated thoroughly, had researched long and hard for any clue, but he had come up with nothing. It could have been simply something his mother kept seeds in, forgotten in the autumn clear up. Noah had told him about the piled-up furniture and he still remembered the sliver of ice that ran down his spine at that moment. He must have been about seven. Growing up in a house where the words ‘intelligent haunting’ and ‘demonic apparition’ were as common as ‘what’s for dinner?’ it took quite a lot to faze him, but this, this was personal.

He felt safe cocooned here, though. Ella fussed over him like an adopted aunt and Carver never treated him as a child, or as someone too small to understand. The danger of what went on here had been firmly ingrained from an early age. He knew there were certain places in the house which were off limits, but that never worried him. It was vast, with rooms aplenty to play in and grounds perfect for any child’s imagination to run riot.

One day, he had asked why he didn’t go to school—not because he wanted to go, but because he was curious. Carver said he had decided home schooling would benefit him more. Gabe had a quick and intelligent mind. He could read fluently by the time he was four. Carver had a teaching diploma, something he had picked up when he didn’t have any idea what he wanted to do with his life. It turned out to be a useful acquisition.

Gabe’s curriculum was diverse. Carver instilled in him the importance of learning, he thrived on the complexities of Latin and Greek, of Egyptian history, of civilisations long lost to the world. Children his own age baffled him and Noah gave up trying to forge him friendships.

He thought he knew how to fix all the questions everyone had. But really, if he thought about it properly, what would he have looked for if he had managed to get inside of the vault?

Still, the knowledge that the last thing that had tethered his family to the earth was now a burnt-out shell stung so badly, he could feel it piercing his skin like tiny venomous needles. No one knew he slipped out to visit, that he spent hours staring at the frontage imagining his mother playing with his infant self and his father.....what? All he had of his father was a few photos and some tarnished silver cuff links. Hard to make an image out of that. What would his life be now, if none of this had happened? He raised himself up onto one elbow, half wanting to go downstairs and face the music and half wanting to crawl under the covers and hide.

Beth slept in the room across the landing. If he concentrated, he could still hear her laughter in his mind. It was beautiful. Today, his father had returned too. If he had gone with Carver and Olivia, would he have seen him? Gabe tried to take stock of his feelings. There was no reason he would have seen him. He didn’t have Olivia’s gift.

Envy and anger descended like a red mist and obscured his vision, obliterating any common sense. He snatched a glass paperweight from the windowsill and hurled it at the wall. It rebounded with a dull thud and fell onto the floor. Apart from a dent in the plaster work, it was intact. He couldn’t even do that right.

‘Fuck it!’ His voice echoed around the room, probably loud enough to be heard downstairs.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

In the parlour, the echo of Gabriel’s exit still hung heavy in the air. Noah mopped up the spilt coffee with a tea towel just to do something.

‘Ella will think you’re after her job,’ Carver said, but there was no warmth in his tone.

Olivia sat bolt upright in the chair as though sitting and relaxing might open her up to more accusations. Ollie’s hand still rested on her shoulder. Her fingers busied themselves twirling the satin tassels on the cushion.

Used to a lifetime of consoling distraught parishioners and injecting hope into hopeless circumstances, Noah spoke first. ‘In your own time, Olivia. Maybe start with why you felt like you had to do it. The how you did it can come after.’ In the back of his mind, he wondered if the fire officers would find anything in the shell to link her to it. He remembered her certainty that there was no one inside.

She chewed her bottom lip, and took a deep breath. In the silence, it seemed an intake of courage. ‘The house was a link, even though none of the original party lived there.’ She resorted to the impersonal professional speak Carver had taught her. ‘I went over your research,’ her eyes fell to her mentor, who seemed relaxed, but Noah could tell from the set of his shoulders that he was far from it. ‘From what I could fathom, you hinted the entity could always return to its base if it needed to and the base remained.’

‘I think you might have been reading between the lines too much, Olivia.’ Carver leaned forward, sliding his hands down his thighs. A muscle twitched in his jaw.

‘It was a professional opinion. The house was a risk. Did you want any chance of…what it was, returning?’ The wavering tone in her voice disappeared, replaced by steel. ‘The house was empty. There was no risk of anyone getting hurt. It was hardly a home; they were always away. And they were well insured. I checked.’

Carver shook his head. ‘I harbour much of what society would call strange in this house. But I have never kept an arsonist.’

The atmosphere in the room dropped a few degrees and Noah stopped breathing for a moment.

‘If you wish, I will turn myself over to the authorities.’ Olivia’s tone was level, measured; all of Carver’s training had clicked into place.

‘No, you damn well won’t!’ Ollie broke his silence. Behind his glasses, his eyes were wide, owl-like. His usual studious demeanour had been cracked open.

‘No one is suggesting anything so radical,’ said Noah, with a pointed glance at his friend. ‘Can I suggest we all take a break? It’s been a very trying time.’ He rose from his chair. ‘I want to check on Beth and Gabe.’

Carver raised an eyebrow and sighed. Noah knew letting Olivia and him battle it out was an accident waiting to happen. Neither of them would back down—it could all get ugly fast. So diffusing the situation might only be a quick fix, but at least it would give them time to cool down and to think.

Carver motioned to the door with his hand. ‘We’ll reconvene for supper this evening. All of us.’ It wasn’t a request.

Olivia stood, letting the cushion fall to the floor. Her chin tilted upwards as she fixed her gaze on him. ‘As you wish.’ She exited with Ollie close behind, leaving a chilly atmosphere in her wake.

Carver let out a deep breath. ‘That went about as badly as it could have done. I want to say this day can’t get any worse. But I fear fate is enjoying this floor show a little too much.’

***

Ollie Taverner knocked on the door separating him from Gabe.

Olivia had disappeared into the research room as soon as they had left the others. He knew better than to ask her if she needed help. She was out to prove a point. He knew she wouldn’t have set fire to the farmhouse without being certain there was no other choice, but the fact that she had actually done it shocked him to the core.

This evening was going to be uncomfortable and upsetting. He sighed and chewed the inside of his lower lip. If it ended with Olivia being asked to leave, he wasn’t sure what he would do. He loved living at The Manor, loved the work and what it stood for, and loved the people who lived here with him, as dysfunctional as they were. It was the first time in his life he had felt like he belonged and he didn’t want to think about leaving it all behind. But he had never been without his twin.

He knocked again. ‘Gabe?’

‘Go away.’

Ollie hesitated, his fist resting on the door. Gabe definitely didn’t seem in the mood for any kind of conversation. And who could blame him.

The door swung open in one sudden swoop. Ollie almost fell in.

‘Nothing you can say will change what she did. Nothing she says will make what she did right.’ Gabe stood in the doorway, his dark hair falling over his face. His eyes were red and swollen.

‘I don’t know why she did it, Gabe. But I know it wasn’t to hurt you, or Beth.’ Ollie tried not to stare at the tear trails on Gabe’s face. ‘But I’m not here to discuss what happened just now. Can I come in?’ Ollie glanced downstairs. The two men were talking, their serious voices drifting upwards.

Gabe shrugged and then stood back, his hand tight-fingered on the door handle. Ollie noticed the paperweight on the floor and the indent above it. Sunlight filtered through the window. The air was stuffy, slightly dusty. A pair of trainers with scuffed black toes peeked out from under the bed. Gabe’s clothes lay discarded, spilling out of a wicker laundry basket. A stack of books in a pile by the bed. It needed an Ella touch.

Ollie lowered himself carefully on the edge of the bed, as if it were a knife blade.

Gabe didn’t move from the door, nor did he relinquish his hold on its handle. They might as well have been complete strangers, not two boys who lived under the same roof.

‘I want you to know that I’m not going to tell Carver about where you were earlier. It wouldn’t help anyone, especially with how things are right now.’ The word ‘things’ took on a distasteful sound, like something nasty found at the bottom of a fridge.

‘To be honest, Ollie, I don’t care. I wish everyone would stop acting as if I need protecting. This is my past we’re talking about. Don’t I deserve to know everything I can about it? Wouldn’t that protect me more?’ Gabe’s voice rose a decibel.

He shifted uncomfortably on the bed. Gabe’s logic had a powerful ring, but it wasn’t long ago that he had stopped building Lego. Somewhere over this long, hot summer he had changed, hovering over the pothole-ridden trail of mid teendom. Ollie could still remember being that age. That was when he and Olivia had first arrived here, certain they were mature enough to handle whatever lay ahead. It had been a steep learning curve. But, Ollie reminded himself, he’d had his sister. The boy facing him, looking like a puppy left out in the rain, was in this by himself.

‘If you want to see inside the vault, I’ll take you. But if the boss man gets wind of this, we’ll both be looking for a new place to stay.’

Gabe’s shoulders dropped visibly and his mouth fell open.

Ollie forced a smile. If he had done the right thing, why did he feel like he had undermined everything this house stood for?

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Edward Carver stood in the hallway of The Manor, mentally picking up the pieces of the last few hours. Shouldn’t he have guessed at breakfast that things were far from settled? Some deep part of him had known life couldn’t continue as it was, as he had fought for. The Manor was a safe-house in more ways than one. The knowledge that events had transpired to cause a rift in the equilibrium gnawed at him like the teeth of a rat.

He watched as Noah went up the stairs to check on Beth, grateful for the other man’s friendship and diplomacy. They were an unlikely duo, a man of faith and a man who dug about in the underbelly of the world. He liked to think they were like weights on opposing ends of a scale. But there were some things even Noah didn’t know.

Carver patted his jacket pocket. Tension ran like a steel rod down his spine. He stopped three times to check no one was following, hearing only the creak of floorboards as others moved upstairs. He knew every groan of this old house. Moving quickly, he took the same path Gabe had only a few hours before. He opened the door leading to the cellar and cold air rushed up to meet him, cooling the sweat on his brow. The echo of his shoes on the stone steps seemed far too loud.

The door of the vault loomed as he flicked on the light. The switch pad welcomed him with its garish green glow, highlighting the veins on the back of his hands. He pulled the key card from his pocket and tapped it against the pad. An amber light flashed. He entered the numerical code swiftly. A row of digital hieroglyphics lit up, one by one, and inside the door, a heavy clunk signalled the entry system sluggishly churning to life. He glanced to the top of the stairs again, made his decision, and pushed open the door.

The interior was lit by a row of ultra violet lights at floor level and the same repeated at ceiling height. The parchments fluoresced under that kind of light and even tiny amounts of ink absorbed it and were legible. It was a cool blue glow backed by a low hum from the inbuilt generator. Shelving hung from the walls with one central safety box located in the middle of the back wall. The atmosphere inside the vault made the hairs stand up on the nape of his neck. Here were the ancient manuscripts too fragile to survive in modern air and temperatures, and artefacts from long lost civilisations; a fragment of a codex written in Maya hieroglyphic script; two stunningly preserved Egyptian papyrus scrolls; and others, remembered only by a passing paragraph in a dusty tome, but everything here was kept hidden to preserve it. Except for one thing.

Carver pressed the centre of the key card and a silver chip clicked into his hand. Unassuming in its power, it lay on his palm. Despite the chill, his hand was sweating. Carver picked it up by its edges and fed it into a tiny slot on the front of the safety box. Inside, a partial vacuum released and the metal door eased open. The air escaped against his wrist and a wave of nausea washed over him.

Part of him wondered why he was even down here. But his gut instinct needed to know it was still here.

He pushed the door back and reached inside. His hands shook as they drew the object out and placed it on an empty shelf. It was wrapped in a thin gauze of white muslin. He peeled off the covering, hating the way it clung to itself like blistered skin.

It was The Box.

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Ella called them all for dinner at 7.30 on the dot.

She had arrived late afternoon and spent the few hours between blasting through the house and polishing invisible smears from every surface. Somehow, she had also managed to cobble together ingredients for a casserole, the smell of which wafted through the halls. Normally this would have had the magical effect of summoning people from inside whatever room they were hiding in. It was common for at least two of them to be found sitting on the stairs, waiting for the dinner announcement. It was an unwritten rule that no one went inside the dining room before Ella spoke. The house might be Carver’s, but she was the Queen of Anything Cuisine.

Tonight, however, was a much more sombre affair. She eyed Carver from behind the slightly misted glasses perched on her nose. Steam wafted from under the lid of the huge dish she was carrying. She placed it in the centre of the dining table and smoothed her hands down her apron.

‘I will leave you to it.’ Her normally cheery voice sounded clipped, nearly business-like, and Noah arched an eyebrow at his friend as they pulled their chairs up to the table. Ella exited with an audible tut in Carver’s direction.

He cleared his throat and shook out a napkin. ‘It seems I’ve managed to alienate Ella, too, and she hasn’t been home five minutes.’

Ollie, Gabe, and Olivia followed each other in, glancing backwards at Ella’s retreating form.

‘I told Ella we wouldn’t be requiring her services with dinner.’ Carver filled them in before anyone could ask any questions.

Noah picked up his water glass and took a sip. ‘Was that before or after she prepared dinner?’

‘Maybe you should say a blessing, just in case.’ Gabriel’s words would have been teasing on any other night.

Olivia seated herself opposite her mentor; she was obviously standing her ground. Ollie half nodded at Gabe behind Carver’s back, before taking the chair next to Noah.

‘I think that’s a very good idea, Gabe.’ Noah looked at them each in turn, and closed his eyes. ‘Let us be thankful for the gift of food and family. May each of us feel the grace of the Lord’s blessing. Amen.’

Now all eyes were on him.

‘What?’ He took a bread roll from the basket. ‘Indulge me. I felt we needed this today.’

The meal was delicious, or it should have been, but no one really tasted or enjoyed Ella’s efforts. They were all too preoccupied with the prospect of the after dinner discussion.

Gabe and Ollie gathered up the plates of half eaten food and took them into the kitchen since Ella had gone to her room.

Noah could hear their hallway conversation.

‘Let Liv tell her side of the story first, Gabe,’ said Ollie. ‘You can rant and rave afterwards if you want to.’

Gabe paused. ‘Something’s changed, Ollie, in this house. Can you feel it?’

Noah dabbed at an imaginary crumb with his napkin and tried to sense whatever it was that was causing Gabe concern, but apart from the rapidly dropping temperature of the air between Carver and Olivia, he couldn’t feel anything.

‘You’re just upset. Things will be back to normal tomorrow, wait and see.’ Ollie let Gabe go in front of him and they both took their seats.

Gabe didn’t look like he was convinced.

Olivia launched into her defence. ‘You said in some of your research notes that in similar cases to the Davenports, the entity returned to its base because that was where it had entered this dimension. Conclusively, if there were no base, it would be forced to seek other refuge.’ She paused, watching their faces for signs of understanding or rebuke, ‘Therefore, Beth and Gabe would be safer with the base destroyed, because the entity would no longer have a pathway to them.’

Noah glanced across to his friend, who was staring at a point on the table, deep in thought. Carver roused himself, clasping his hands in front of him as he spoke.

‘Similar cases, that’s the sticking point. We don’t know what we’re dealing with here, there are only a few documented events that are similar, and they didn’t involve a demon that manifested in smoke. For all we know, the b...’ he stopped suddenly, ‘the base was only a starting block. It may have as much need for that house as a butterfly needs from its cocoon. I wish you’d come to me, Olivia, so we could have discussed it before you decided to play with matches.’

‘I followed my instincts,’ she replied. ‘Just as you told us to.’

‘You undermined my authority and put the reputation of this house at risk. Did you not think of the consequences? What if you’d been caught?’ Carver clenched one hand into a fist that hovered over the table.

‘I was extremely careful.’ Her chin tilted upwards a fraction.

Noah intercepted. ‘Gabe, you’re extremely quiet. What are your thoughts?’

‘I told you what I thought earlier and that hasn’t changed.’ He was strangely subdued and Noah grimaced. He preferred Gabe raging, at least then he was showing true emotion.

An awkward silence filled the room. In one short day, they all seemed to have drifted apart. Noah wondered if the repercussions would still be felt years from now.

‘What about both Beth and Liv seeing Gabe’s father?’ said Ollie.

‘My father was the one returning to his base.’ Gabe raised his head and looked across at Olivia. ‘It was the last place we were all together. Maybe he never moved on and the trauma of losing the house was enough to tap through to Beth. Maybe you saw him because she opened up a pathway, a tear in the membrane that separates this world from any other.’

Carver nodded. He looked impressed. ‘That’s a distinct possibility. Part of me wants to go back and see if he appears again, but I’m not sure Beth would be up to it.’

‘Then take me.’ Gabe’s voice was strong, even. It was more of a demand than a suggestion.

‘Okay, I think we’ve done as much as we can tonight. Everybody is tired and frazzled.’ Carver slid his chair back and rose to his feet. ‘Noah, could you stay for a few minutes? I need to talk to you alone.’

Gabe lingered in the doorway.

‘We’ll discuss this more tomorrow,’ said Carver. His tone declared that it was not up for negotiation.

The curator waited until Gabe’s footsteps disappeared upstairs. He stood with his back against the door as if his presence was enough to block anyone or anything outside, then ran his fingers through his neatly groomed hair.

‘Noah, I haven’t been completely honest with you about everything. I want to ask you to come downstairs with me, to the vault.’

***

The two men stood in silence, looking down at the weathered surface of the box.

‘You told me you had burnt it.’ Noah’s fingers played with the small cross, which he wore under his collar.

‘I thought it best everyone assumed it was gone. But I couldn’t destroy something I didn’t fully understand. This was a husk for whatever came from it. I wanted to know why and how it had got here. I don’t think it’s dangerous in itself.’

‘But you kept it hidden behind several layers of cold, hard steel, and in a locked container?’

‘Better to be safe than sorry. Plus, I didn’t want anyone finding it. Whatever was in here wanted Gabe. I wasn’t going to risk him coming across it and possibly setting another disaster in motion.’

Noah’s lips were dry. He ran his tongue over them and immediately wiped the back of his hand over his mouth. The air in here tasted like a newly opened grave. Carver wasn’t making any sense. On one hand, he didn’t think the vessel for the entity posed a threat, and on the other, he feared that letting Gabe know about it would unleash some other mayhem. An old fear uncurled itself in his belly.

‘I want you to take it.’ One of the ultra violet lights flickered, casting dark shadows under the older man’s eyes. Noah’s heart dropped into his stomach. ‘I don’t think it’s safe here anymore, not with everything that’s gone down today. You saved Gabe and Beth by using the tools of your faith. The entity feared your faith. I don’t want it under the same roof as Beth and Gabe.’

‘Why now?’ Noah had to clench his teeth together to stop the fear in his throat spiralling out.

‘Because Gabriel has come of age. And I think that’s what it’s been waiting for.’

Chapter Thirty

The twilight frightened Beth Davenport.

Every evening, she sat by her window hoping for clouds in the night sky. The stars reminded her of some old memory, something that lingered on the edge of her consciousness, calling her name in the dark. But this was the time when swallows darted in daredevil dives, gathering night midges for a hungry brood. The chicks squabbled under the eaves, their voices shrill as a parent swooped in with dinner. Tonight was just like any other. She had forgotten her little jaunt earlier, had forgotten hearing the baby cry, had forgotten seeing the ghost of her long-dead husband. Which was a blessing. She stared out onto the lawn, brushing the knots from her white hair with a boar bristle brush Stu had given her the Christmas before Gabriel was born.

A tree branch moved in the corner of her vision, suddenly weighted down. The leaves were full and densely green but something jumped about behind them. She stopped brushing and focused her attention on the movement. It was too early for her owls to make an appearance.

The branch bounced and a large black and white bird took flight. It flew towards her and landed on the windowsill, scrabbling for balance on the wood surface. It cocked its head to one side and ruffled its feathers. Beth laughed with glee and reached across to tap the glass. The bird responded with its own rap and cawed. She could see its little black tongue clicking as it opened its dark grey beak. A frown creased her brow. Ella had told her never to open the window by herself. But could it matter? She wasn’t going to climb out or do anything silly. The bird tapped again. It really wanted to play. She unclipped the catch and pushed the sash window up slightly. The wood creaked and she stopped, turning her head to the door. But everyone was downstairs, their muffled voices drifted up from the dining room.

The bird ducked its head under the raised window and blinked a beady eye, then squeezed itself underneath in a flurry of feathers. In the light from her room, the dark part of its plumage carried a sheen of blue-black. It was the most beautiful bird she had ever seen. She held out her hand and it jumped onto her wrist, surprisingly light for such a large creature. Beth sighed softly.

The bird took flight and landed at the side of her half eaten supper. It dug into the remains of her scrambled eggs and toast, tossing morsels into the air and deftly catching them. Beth clasped her hands together, delight lighting up her face

Would Ella let her keep it? She doubted the fastidious housekeeper would approve. A secret, then. Carver had told her secrets were bad things and she mustn’t keep anything from him, but surely a little pet didn’t matter?

***

The chimes of the grandfather clock heralded half past midnight. A light breeze stirred the curtains in Beth Davenport’s room, carrying the scent of the honeysuckle, which crept across the back of the house in curls and tangles.

The house slumbered in darkness, its inhabitants tucked up inside their beds. It had been a very long day and all of them were glad to be saying farewell to it.

Noah slept fitfully in the guest bedroom. The object of his disturbed sleep was spending its last night entombed in its metal prison. Fifteen years ago, he had handed the box to Carver. An innocuous, sodden vessel—but even then, it had felt like it had been vomited from hell. He could still remember the feel of it in his fingers, the way it made his flesh crawl as though a hundred insects were trying to burrow under his skin. Even now, if he was agitated, he would scratch away at his wrists, sometimes until he made them bleed. The marks took months to heal, sometimes scabbing, sometimes bruising deeply.

Gabriel lay curled up in the foetal position, his back against the wall and one hand splayed out across his pillow. The pain of loss cast shadows under his eyes. He had never felt more alone. Even Ollie’s offer to help him gain access to the vault couldn’t plug the empty hole opening up inside.

Olivia hadn’t bothered to change for bed. She lay on top of the covers, legs clad in dark jeans, dreaming of old ghosts engulfed in flames.

Ollie had fallen asleep with his laptop across his knees. It had slid to one side and gone into standby mode, one single blue light pulsing into the darkness. His glasses lay on the bedside table, smeared with fingerprints. Without them, he looked younger, more vulnerable.

Carver wasn’t in the house. He had slipped out after his conversation with Noah, knowing that he wouldn’t be able to rest. Noah had agreed to take the box, but Carver could see that the prospect terrified him. Only the curator’s appeal that Gabe and Beth’s safety might be at stake had convinced him that he had no choice. But what kind of man forces a friend to do something like that?

Carver stood by the ruins of Beth’s farmhouse under the late summer moon. A torch dangled from his hand, its beam casting yellow circles of light onto the ash-covered gravel. He had come to find Stu, which by all accounts was a desperate move, as he didn’t have the gift of ghost sight. Sometimes he questioned the life he had made for himself. Despite all of his knowledge and experience in the paranormal, he didn’t have any talents, only the gift to nurture the bizarre in others.

There was nothing in the burnt-out shell apart from a slice of moonlight carving itself through a gap in the collapsed roof.

The newest guest in The Manor knew all of this. It fluffed out a spray of tail feathers, fluttering its way from room to room checking on each inhabitant and easily slipping into their defenceless, sleeping minds. Beth had made a small nest under the bed from a wicker basket and a red shawl—a kind act from an innocent, childlike soul.

Today it had remembered its name, or the name it had last been known by. Aka Maga, breath of corruption.

Kind of dear Beth to invite me in, it thought. So fitting she should be the one to spark the flame of destruction. This time, it wouldn’t be defeated. It was stronger now—fifteen years stronger—and wiser. It knew the minds of modern men, their strengths and weaknesses. Especially their weaknesses. It had used its time wisely, learning to manipulate minds, to train them to its needs and whims. The pet dog that savaged its master’s child, the endangered species that ate its young, the nurse who turned off a newborn’s incubator—all part of its learning curve in control.

It had licked its wounds over its loss on that snow-filled night, had dwelt on the moment where the priest interrupted its descent into the squalling infant. It had planned and plotted and schemed. It wasn’t only about corrupting the boy; it had a grudge to avenge. The priest, the curator who had meddled into things that didn’t concern him, Beth. It wanted them all to know pain and loss and the great black weight of hopelessness.

And it had such deliciously wicked plans for the boy.

Chapter Thirty-One

On the lawn where Beth had seen little lions gambolling, a tall, dark figure watched the house. Keen eyes, well used to finding their way even without the help of moonlight, scanned the walls. Heat from the day still radiated from the dark red brickwork.

Intrigue had brought him. He knew what this place was and what they did here. He was amused by their dedication, but this amusement tended to be a brief affair. Still, it held enough magnetism to draw his attention whenever he passed by. Tonight, there was a different presence within the walls and it had all the makings of a very entertaining interlude. He smiled, but his eyes showed no mirth. They hadn’t for nearly three hundred years.

He toyed with his options. Sit back and watch what unfolded? Find an entrance and join in the fun? Drive out what dwelt there and take his leave? Many choices, many ways the dice could fall. It was…appealing.

All the darkened windows facing the lawn were open, hoping for the freshness of a night breeze to stir the sticky air. He inclined his head to one side and chose the window on the right, for no other reason than the scent that filtered down from it, to his acute senses.

It was too easy to scramble up the wall, the creeping honeysuckle forming wooden fingers to aid his ascent. The sash window lifted as though it weighed no more than a feather. The figure in the bed remained motionless as his feet touched the floor, noiseless.

It had been a while since he had been inside a modern dwelling, if you could call this place that. Its foundations were older than he was and he respected their seniority. The bed stood against the window wall, the covers kicked back and bunched to one side. It was a tiny space, especially when you were used to constellations as your ceiling. The flotsam of human life lay scattered about the room, but his gaze fell to the pile of books immediately. They were the only thing he really recognized. So, some intelligence in the slumbering mind.

He studied the face half hidden from view. Taut, pale skin and dark brows. The tiniest quivering of an eyelid. The moon’s reflection turned a high cheekbone to marble. Below, a small dimple. Hair that fell across the pillow, the curve of a sharply defined jaw. Youth personified. A fluttering of something that might have been remembrance stirred in his brain. It had been a long time since he had been this close to something human without regarding it as edible, but he had fed tonight, not from need but from boredom.

Instinct prickled the hair at the nape of his neck. The beasts on the land, the fish in the ocean, and the birds in the sky still carried the same reflex. Only the soft and tender human mammal has lost this vital sense. Outside on the landing, another form of supernatural creature bristled with the same survival instinct.

The door yawned open. Out of the dense darkness, a shape launched itself towards him and halted in mid-air. Its form dissolved into a shapeless swirl of black, a somehow cloying substance, not quite solid and not quite gas. It rose in a menacing pillar. A silent language, old and cracked, emanated from inside, but he understood it, as predators do.

Its threats were malice-ridden and thick with hate. It staked a claim to this house and its occupants, screaming its fury at his interruption. He stood his ground, slamming closed the shield of his thoughts. It had tried to filter into his mind as soon as it had changed its form. Its touch burned into the flesh of his scalp. This was madness—but madness with a purpose, which made it deadly dangerous.

They faced each other whilst Gabriel slept, like two gunslingers, weighing up each other’s weaknesses.

Later, the vampire would stop and contemplate what had drawn him here this night and what battle he had wandered into. A challenge was something he vaguely remembered. It was something he had never walked away from. It wasn’t as if he had any feelings for the human inhabitants, but this entity was a threat to him and to others like him. The thought of his species being ruled by such a being was unthinkable.

It had its dangers, of course, one of which was discovery by the ones who lived here. They would know what he was and possibly have ways to impede or even threaten him, but that thought posed no cause for concern. They were, after all, flesh and blood, and therefore expendable.

He toured the house after his assailant had melted into the shadows. No one had backed down, but no one had made the first move. They were both astute enough to know that the way to beat an enemy is to discover its flaws. He looked in on the boy a little before 6 a.m. The first rays of light brightened the eastern sky and he had no choice but to withdraw to his hiding place. The boy’s face was turned towards the window, his hand raised above his head, resting palm up on his pillow. His fingers curved over his palm, causing his lifeline to deepen. It had many tendrils running from it.

The vampire cupped his hand under Gabriel’s, the soft cotton of the pillowcase slightly warm from the boy’s skin. He closed his fingers so the smaller fist lay completely enclosed in his. It would be sweet to gather up this young bundle and be gone from here before the boy even stirred. A trickle of saliva dripped into his mouth. The blood would be vibrant.

He steeled himself, letting Gabriel’s hand fall back upon its pillow. There was time enough for pleasure, but the greater task was of more importance.

The raised window was the only sign of his presence and he had left that on purpose.

Let the boy wonder.

Chapter Thirty-Two

Gabe awoke with a start.

Outside his window, birds chattered, a light breeze wafted his curtains and the sun stole in through the gap. Another perfect late-summer dawn. He sat up and rubbed his right hand. It felt cold and a little numb. His half-awake brain told him that he must have slept on it all night.

The house was still quiet. He squinted at his phone and groaned. 6.40 a.m. This was stupid early. He contemplated pulling the covers over his head and going back to sleep, but his mind had dived into the day, juggling the contents of yesterday around like a clown spinning plates.

The link to his old life had gone up in smoke, which had to be the kicker of all ironies. Olivia’s actions had pried open the old scars, found the tender tissue underneath, and sprinkled a liberal amount of salt into the wound. All of his ridiculous childhood dreams of taking his mother back to their home after vanquishing the demon seemed just that—the daydreams of a child. Did it really matter anymore if he found something in the vault? Like hell it did. He still had a score to settle. It irked him more than he was willing to admit that Carver had never really come up with anything concrete. I mean, the guy was one of the top professionals in his field, so why did he seem willing to file it all away as a cold case?

Ollie had agreed to help him, which was a definite plus point, but he knew his friend wouldn’t take any more risks than he had to. The timing would have to be right—and that could take months. Gabe decided then and there he wasn’t prepared to wait that long.

He pulled on a pair of jeans and a creased t-shirt he scooped from the floor. Running a hand through his hair, he padded barefoot to the door. The birds were in full chorus and the swallow chicks incessant as they demanded breakfast. They were louder than normal. Gabe stopped and spun round, his mouth dropping open. There was a reason he could hear them better; his window was nearly fully open. And he knew that he hadn’t done it.

An agonised screech hit him right between the eyes. Gabe half stumbled to the window and looked out. A picture-perfect morning with barely a cloud in the sky and the sun, still rising, like liquid gold. Down on the lawn and beneath the cherry tree, a large magpie held something down with one of its taloned feet. A swallow chick.

Gabe shouted and waved his arms, but the bird ignored him. He shouted again, this time louder, and grabbed a trainer from the floor. His aim wasn’t spot on but it was near enough to scare away any bird he had ever known. But this one merely ruffled its feathers and fixed him with a glassy stare—before delivering death to the hapless chick. One for sorrow…

A wave of nausea rose in Gabe’s throat. He pulled down the window hard enough to cause the glass to rattle, but still the bird continued to feast. It pulled a long, pink trail of tissue from the small belly of its prize and he gagged. Gabe only just made the bathroom. The tiles were cold under his feet as he cupped his hand beneath the sink faucet, and splashed his face. He wasn’t normally squeamish, but there was something about the way the bird had acted that unnerved him.

He contemplated waking Ollie, but decided he wasn’t in the mood for talking. The house was rarely this quiet. Or maybe he was rarely up early enough to enjoy it. He padded down the stairs, the carpet soft under his feet.

He knew where he was heading, but with each step, a niggling uncertainty grew. For close on a year, a seed inside him had sprouted and then grown roots. He couldn’t pinpoint an exact moment in time when everything felt different; he just woke up one morning, knowing he couldn’t resist the growing need to find out why. But now, the time had come to actually put his plan into action. Could he do it? Truth be told, he didn’t have a plan, only a daydream that he would a) discover something everyone else had missed and b) have the knowledge/balls to put it into action.

In the kitchen, the dishes from last night were where Ollie and he had dumped them. Ella must really be in a strop if she hadn’t cleared them by now. The congealed remains of the casserole reminded Gabe about the magpie and he shuddered. The inside of his mouth was coated with the disgusting fur of throwing up. He poured a glass of orange juice from the fridge. It was so quiet he could hear himself swallowing. He felt strange, like someone had pulled him out of his normal life and dropped him inside another that looked the same, but wasn’t. He couldn’t remember a time when nearly everyone was at war with each other.

The grandfather clock chimed the hour and Gabe jumped, dropping the glass. It hit the tiles and smashed into a million pieces. He swore under his breath, clenching his teeth in frustration. Maybe he should have stayed in bed.

Ella kept all her cleaning supplies in the boot room, a small square annex off the main kitchen. It also housed another entrance door to the cellar where she kept surplus jars of jams and preserves on shelves built under the stairs. When Gabe was little, he’d had to weigh up his need for another jar of gooseberry with his fear of what might be down there, even though Ella’s side of the cellar was well lit and shielded from the main part by the wall forming the old coal bunker. There were air holes in the bricks where you could just about peer through, if you were brave enough.

The door was slightly ajar.

He paused. No one really went down there but Ella. His sticky feet clung to the tiles as though they didn’t want him to open it. Hooking a finger around the edge of the door, he eased it back. A cold draught met his face, ruffling his hair. He listened, holding his breath.

‘Ella?’ His voice echoed through the dark void below.

The reasoning side of his brain told him it was an old door with an old catch, it had simply sprung open. He should be cleaning up the mess in the kitchen before Ella appeared. Trouble didn’t have to be looked for; it was lying right behind him in a puddle of juice and glass shards.

He rested his palm against the door. A fraction of a second before his brain told his muscles to push it shut, there was a noise. Stock still, and with one foot lifted slightly off the floor, he listened, honing that one sense. It was the unmistakably electronic click of the vault door whirring into life.

Who the hell was down there at this time?

Very carefully, Gabe pulled open the door again. If he wanted to find out what was going on, he would have to go down the steps in the dark. Whoever was in the main part of the cellar hadn’t put the overhead lights on.

Irrational childhood fear froze him to the spot. Going down into the cellar had been the one thing that had truly scared him when he was little. Carver had once told him that everyone fears something, but it was the mind that fed it. ‘Get a grip. Get a grip.’ The whispered words clogged at the back of his throat. He forced one foot down. The first few steps were visible in the light from the boot room, but the rest were swallowed whole by the darkness.

One.

Two.

Three.

He slid his hand down the rail by the wall, well aware of the drop on the other side. The health and safety in Tudor times had been severely lacking. Coldness leeched into the soles of his feet and into his bones. He wished he had put on shoes.

Now he was in near total darkness. The light at the top of the stairs dimmed, as though a huge cloud had gone over the sun. His eyes searched madly for something to focus on, but it was his hearing that spurred him onwards. The whir from the vault burbled from the other side of the wall, tantalisingly close. Gabe wished that he had thought to count the steps as a boy, but scrabbling up them had been the only thing on his mind, jam pot in hand. After what seemed like an eternity, his feet found level ground. He felt his way forwards, arms outstretched, until his fingers found the bunker wall. An exhalation of breath rushed from his lungs. His eyes gradually became more accustomed to the dark. He could make out where the floor met the wall and the top of the stairs where the door stood slightly open. Had he pull it closed a little bit?

The air bricks ran in a diagonal line from ceiling to floor every two feet. He stooped to peer through the nearest one but could only make out the edge of the wall housing the vault. Disappointment punched him in the gut. The wall was the wrong angle to have any view of the vault door.

His only choice was to retrace his steps and go down to the cellar the main way—and that would be risky. He didn’t have any excuse to be wandering about that part of the house, especially if it was Carver. It had to be him, didn’t it? Tears prickled his eyes and he ran the back of his hand over them, angry at himself, angry at fate for dangling an opportunity in front of him, then snatching it away.

He turned, his eyes smarting and swimming. Dust. Just brilliant. He had managed to rub grit in his eyes from the wall. Through the haze, he stumbled, finding the base of the steps with the side of one foot. His eyes burned. Even rubbing them with his t-shirt didn’t help. The climb seemed to take longer than his descent. The numbness in his feet made every step difficult. He wasn’t sure where the edges of the steps were and he sure as hell couldn’t see a thing.

A horrible skittering sound swelled up from under the stairs—the same sound he had heard yesterday.

Gabe took flight, scrabbling up the remainder of the stairs on his hands and knees. One shin hit stone, scraping off a few layers of skin. The sound rose, grew louder, and his legs gave way, sending him down on one hip, fingers desperately searching for something to cling on to. His eyes streamed. The top of the steps was only a few feet away, but it looked like miles. A blurred, dark shape shot into his line of vision from the boot room. Instinctively, he put up his hands to shield his face moments before it dived, beating his head with its wings. The rush of feathers swarmed over his skin, covering his nose and mouth. He flailed at it, but it was lightning fast. A ringing noise rose in his ears as he fought for breath, his spine digging into the unforgiving stone. And then he was flying. Falling.

A scream tore out of his lungs.

Chapter Thirty-Three

The backs of Noah’s hands glowed blue in the false light. He hadn’t slept all night. Or at least it felt that way.

Carver had insisted he stay over after dropping the bombshell about the box and Noah was glad he hadn’t refused. He was in no condition to drive. Carver’s words replayed in his mind on a continuous loop, and no matter how many times it went around, the cold hard fact remained that Noah would have to take the box under his own roof. He didn’t know how he would ever sleep again.

A germ of an idea had sprouted some time before dawn in that pre-light quiet just before the birds began to sing. He didn’t have to keep it under his roof, not exactly. His church, which sat a hundred yards from his vicarage, would be a much safer option. Noah tried not to think about the fact that he might be using God as the ultimate baby sitter purely to overlay his lack of courage.

He had asked Carver for the override codes to the vault before finally agreeing to take guardianship of the box. The curator had blustered, saying it wasn’t safe for him to know, that no one else had ever known, but Noah wouldn’t back down. Carver finally relented when he pointed out that ‘safe’ didn’t really come into it anymore. He wasn’t about to have any more secrets dumped on him. Carver had had the good grace to look fairly sheepish as they said goodnight.

But as Noah lay there staring at the ceiling, he knew if he didn’t get up and put his plan into action, he might come up with an excuse to himself why he couldn’t do it. His car was on the driveway, waiting for him to grow a pair. The Lord’s Prayer fluttered into his mind. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. At that point, Noah had swung his legs out of bed quickly.

But now, in the eerie light of the vault as he faced his fears, his courage had lost its voice. He steeled himself to pick it up, fully expecting the same sensations to flood through him as on that January morning fifteen years ago. The flat of his fingers touched the lid and he tensed, the thump of his blood in his ears incredibly loud in the near silence. He curled those fingers down the back. Nothing. All he felt was the muslin cloth covering. A sound welled up in his throat, half laugh, half groan.

It was at that precise moment Gabe screamed.

Noah jerked his head up, adrenaline coursing through his veins in an instinctive fight or flight response.

‘Gabriel!’ His feet stumbled as he shot out of the vault like a bullet from a gun. ‘Gabe, where are you?’ He listened, half needing to hear the boy scream again to locate him, but fearing that sound with as just as much need.

The interior glow of the vault’s lights didn’t stretch very far, but it was enough to see that no one else was down here in this part of the cellar...and then he knew, sprinting down to the adjoining wall, searching for an eye-level air brick to peer through...it was nearly pitch black on the other side—all he could make out was the open door at the stop of the steps.

‘Oh God, Gabe...’ His whisper began in his throat and choked him.

Noah ran. He launched himself up the cellar steps, hitting his elbow hard on the door frame at the top but barely feeling it. The corridor leading from the main house looked excruciatingly long as he sped through, eyes fixed on the door that separated him from the kitchen. He prayed, harder than he had ever prayed before. If anything happened to Gabe...he didn’t want to think about it.

He powered through the door, sending it careering back to crash into the wall behind, and skidded into the kitchen. The stacked up dishes, the smashed glass on the floor...it did nothing to allay the heavy weight of fear in his throat.

He found himself making bargains with God: if Gabe is okay, I’ll pray harder, stop drinking, start a charity. Anything to stop the image of what he might find at the bottom of the cellar steps. Why wasn’t the light on? Noah paused at the old door, the door with the catch Ella was always complaining about, the door with so many layers of paint, slices of life trapped forever between each layer. He swung it fully open to bathe the stairs with light. Another second of blinding fear.

‘Gabriel?’ His voice faltered. The boy he had been nurturing since infanthood had the name of an archangel. Surely God would look after him?

‘No!’ He ran down the steps, taking no care even though he knew how slippery they could be. The boy lay in a crumpled heap at the bottom, face down with his arms over his head. His feet were dirty and bare. Noah knelt down, his hands shaking as they searched for a pulse, shaking even more when they felt one. Very carefully, he eased Gabriel’s body onto its side. He raked his fingers through his hair. Recovery position? It had gone completely out of his mind.

The boy’s face was covered in scratches and a deep graze ran along his right cheek. His eyes were puffy and red. But he was breathing.

‘Gabe, wake up.’ Noah cradled his head gently, wondering what had brought the boy down to the cellar at this time of the morning. He must have slipped on the stairs.

Gabriel’s eyelids flickered and he groaned.

‘Easy now. You had a fall, but you’re okay.’ Noah’s voice sounded more reassuring than he felt.

Gabe tried to sit up, then covered his face with his crossed arms and flinched. ‘Is it gone? Tell me it’s gone.’ His voice shook.

‘What’s gone, Gabe? There’s nothing here.’

‘The bird. I think it was trying to kill me.’

Chapter Thirty-Four

Edward Carver savoured being the first person downstairs in The Manor.

His routine never altered. Pick up the newspaper from the front door (he paid an extra fee for having his name at the top of the delivery list), go into the kitchen and set up the coffee maker if Ella hadn’t done it the night before, then settle in the small library, which was in the east wing and which had the best light first thing in the morning. He was a proud man and disliked the limitation of glasses. This way, he could absorb the front page in all of its glory with no wire frame perched upon his nose. This was also his thinking time, before the rest of the house clattered down and another day swung into shape. The repercussions of yesterday played heavy on his mind and he wanted another chat with Noah before he took charge of the box. Even thinking about it triggered a bitter taste in his mouth. He was well aware of the danger he might be putting Noah in.

The curator stopped dead in the kitchen doorway, newspaper folded under his arm. His gaze swept the room and the debris scattered on the floor. Wondering if Ella had forgiven him and made an even earlier start, he called the housekeeper’s name.

Voices filtered through from the doorway that led down to the jam cellar, but it wasn’t Ella. Noah appeared out of the gloom with his arm slung around Gabriel. Noah’s lips were set in a thin line as he manoeuvred the boy into the boot room, both of them blinking at the sun pouring in through the window.

Carver opened his mouth, half in alarm and half in confusion, but Noah interrupted before any words could come out.

‘Help me get him somewhere comfortable, Edward. I don’t think anything major is broken, but he’s had a knock to the head and he’s not talking any sense.’

Shock glued Carver’s feet to the floor for a split second before he complied, sliding his arm around Gabe from the other side. He was deathly pale and covered in scratches. The graze along his cheek, studded with grit and dust, needed medical attention. The two men half carried Gabe into what was affectionately called The Snug, a small room to the left of the kitchen. In winter, the fire was always lit and at least one of the inhabitants of the house could always be found curled up in a chair, wrapped in a throw or two.

‘Easy, Gabe,’ said Noah as they lowered him down onto the worn sofa. They both saw him wince at the effort.

‘How? Why?’

Noah spoke to him over the top of Gabe’s head. ‘I think he fell down the steps. I found him at the bottom, but the light wasn’t on.’

‘Don’t whisper. I can hear you. And I didn’t fall.’ Gabriel flexed one wrist back and forth and grimaced. He ran his tongue over his lips.

‘Can I have a drink of water?’ He curled his fingers into his palms and dabbed at a skinned knuckle with his tongue. ‘And I hold my hand up to the mess in the kitchen. I knew getting up early was bad for me.’

Gabe’s attempt at humour fell flat. The two men exchanged a glance.

‘But what were you doing in the cellar?’ Carver knelt down. There was nothing in his voice but concern.

Gabe hesitated. ‘I...I heard a noise so I thought I should take a look. I thought it was Ella at first, but obviously it wasn’t...’ his voice trailed off and his face became solemn. ‘There was a bird. I saw it on the lawn when I woke up. It just flew at me and started clawing and pecking. That’s why I fell.’

Carver saw him look away towards the window and dab at the insides of both eyes with his thumb.

‘Okay, Gabe. We’ll take a look down there and make sure it isn’t still about. Maybe it had got trapped and you spooked it.’ His own explanation sounded feeble but he wanted to try and calm the situation down. Any hopeful ideas he had had about today being a better day were rapidly being torn to shreds—and they hadn’t even had breakfast.

‘Any headache, Gabe? Disturbed vision?’ Noah hovered, his hands shoved in his pockets. He looked exhausted. It seemed like no one had had much sleep at all last night.

‘I’m fine, honestly. There’s nothing broken but my street cred.’

‘Well, that can take quite a few knocks without any lasting damage. But,’ Carver held out one hand, forefinger extended, ‘I’m going to ring Doctor Phillips and get him to call in when he’s finished his rounds. It’s either that, or I run you down to A & E right now.’

Gabe accepted the inevitable with a good amount of grace.

Carver sighed. Any event in the cellar set off his internal alarm bells. There were still a lot of unanswered questions, but Gabe needed time to recuperate. Noah’s hand squeezed his shoulder.

‘I’m going to clean up that mess before someone does themselves an injury.’

‘Thank you. If you could find it in you to put on the coffee too, I would be forever grateful.’

Noah turned, slightly bemused, ‘I’m going to apply for Ella’s job, or at least ask for privileges. By the way, where is she this morning?’

‘Probably still teaching me a lesson. I should know there are some battles I cannot win.’

Not one of them had mentioned the box, but the weight of it hung heavy between them.

***

‘What happened in the kitchen?’ Ollie Taverner poked his head around the snug door, his hair rumpled from sleep.

Carver was on his phone finishing off a conversation, blocking most of his view of Gabe. Ollie waited, aware of Carver’s serious tone and the fact that Gabe was up far too early. He wondered what trouble Gabe had got himself into this time and hoped it wasn’t anything to do with what he had been mentoring him on. Or even worse, his trip down to the cellar.

Carver slid the phone into his jacket pocket. His face bore the expression of a man who had climbed out of bed and hit the ground running. He beckoned Ollie in and Ollie got his first full look at Gabe.

‘Jesus, Gabe.’ He rushed over and knelt beside the sofa as Carver had done only minutes ago. ‘Are you okay?’

‘I’m fine, don’t fuss.’ Gabe’s answer didn’t do much to ease his concern. He looked far from fine. Scratches spattered his face and the backs of his hands and a nasty graze glowered along one cheekbone.

‘I came down to find World War III in here. The kitchen looks like a herd of wildebeest stomped through, and you look like you got in their way.’ Ollie tried to lighten the mood as he slid onto the sofa. He mouthed to the older man.

Carver shook his head.

‘What?’ said Gabe, who hadn’t missed the subtle communication.

‘Ollie was wondering if we had an uninvited guest.’

‘Of the poltergeist variety. The smashed glass, the mess in the kitchen...’ Ollie filled in for Gabe. It didn’t explain his injuries though. Most poltergeists didn’t attack people, only objects.

‘Gabe fell down the jam cellar stairs.’

‘I didn’t fall!’ Gabe’s voice rose an octave. ‘Or rather I did, but only because I was attacked by the bird. Why won’t you believe me?’

‘A bird?’ Ollie scratched his head. This whole morning was starting to go crazy.

‘Wasn’t Noah in the kitchen?’ said Carver.

‘Not when I looked in.’

‘Stay with Gabe. I don’t want him left by himself. Doctor Phillips is coming over later, but he’s not sure when.’ Carver headed in the direction of the kitchen.

‘Okay. Tell me what happened.’ Ollie slid one arm around Gabe’s slender shoulders and hugged him.

Gabe nodded and swallowed, then bit his lower lip. He took an audible breath before launching into his explanation once again.

Chapter Thirty-Five

Noah’s smile disappeared as soon as he turned into the hallway. Now that Gabe seemed to have sustained no lasting damage, the fact he had left the vault open to all and sundry sunk in and seemed to knock all of the light out of the day. He would have to change his plan. The whole idea was to take the box and stow it away in the church before he could get cold feet. Something else niggled at the back of his mind. Gabe had said he had heard a noise from the cellar. Could Noah have been seen? And if so, did Gabe know what he was doing there?

Carver wanted the box as far away from Gabe and Beth as possible. Noah had seen the change in Gabe for himself and he knew adolescence could trigger any amount of preternatural energy. For the first time since his friend had explained the danger last night, Noah understood.

Glancing behind him, Noah headed for the kitchen but veered off to the right, down the corridor he had sprinted along so recently, towards the cellar. The ultra violet glow from the lights and the whir of the vault’s internal fan greeted him. It sounded like a jet engine, but Noah knew that was only his guilt surfacing. Over the past twenty-four hours, everything had changed. There were secrets between them all, now. He should have been the one to fix it, not join in with his own schemes.

Down the stone steps, the door to the vault yawned open. The air smelled sour, like a room that had been closed tight against the sunlight for decades. He prayed Carver hadn’t followed him, baying for his caffeine fix. It wouldn’t take long to slide the box away into its hiding place and close the vault door. Just a few minutes was all he needed...

He stopped dead and blinked. He looked away, and blinked again. His heart dipped into his stomach as he covered his hand over his mouth in disbelief.

The muslin shroud lay crumpled on the shelf. But the box was gone.

***

Noah knelt on the floor in the kitchen, picking up pieces of broken glass and feeding them into a cereal box. He looked up as Carver came in.

‘I thought it was safer to put them in cardboard.’ He paused mid-way, orange juice dripping from a long shard.

The two men eyed each other, both of them with things to say, but unwilling to voice those words in case it tipped the uncertainty of the day into free-fall.

Noah stood and rinsed his hands under the tap. He looked outside, his reflection showing a troubled man. It was a beautiful day with hardly a cloud in the sky. Would he feel better if it was cold and wet? It would match his mood, at least. Finally he spoke, knowing he had to confess. He was usually on the other side of the coin. A slight rush of heat rose in his face.

‘Gabe said he heard something, that’s why he went down into the cellar. That something was me. I was in the vault. I was going to take the box and hide it in a holy place. Then I heard a scream. It was Gabe. So I ran.’ He paused, aware he was contributing to the shattering of their close knit family unit. A small bloom of blood smeared across his palm from one of the glass fragments. It looked like stigmata. ‘I left the door open when I ran off to find Gabe. I’ve just been down there to close it. Edward...’ His voice dropped, ‘it’s gone. The box is gone.’

Carver gripped the back of one of the kitchen chairs. Noah took one step towards him then stopped, but Carver lowered his head and closed his eyes. I know what’s in his mind, thought Noah. He’s wondering how it could be gone. Why did I go down there without him? Who would take it? And he’s just as scared as I am.

‘Carver?’ Noah’s voice sounded far away even to his own ears.

‘As far as I could tell, no one knew about what was in the vault. I kept it that way because I thought it would be safer.’

‘I’m sorry. I take full responsibility. But when I heard Gabriel scream, I just ran.’

Carver sighed and exhaled deeply. A weary sound. ‘We can rule out Gabe then. Plus, I don’t think he has any idea about the box. It wasn’t you or me. Ollie? No. I can read him like a book and he follows rules. He wouldn’t have gone in the vault without my permission. I think we can safely rule out Beth. And Ella. So that only leaves one other person.’ Carver sighed. ‘Your hand, Noah.’ He pointed to the swell of blood, watching as one fat droplet hovered, and fell to the floor.

‘Olivia.’ Noah met his gaze, then dropped his eyes to his injured hand. He pressed his thumb onto the cut.

Carver turned and walked to the front door, surveying the gravelled expanse, dappled by shade from the hydrangea bushes. The bright pink mop heads of the flowers dazzled against the deep green foliage. Olivia’s car was still there.

Noah joined him, nursing his hand, wrapped in a tea towel.

The two men passed the snug door, looking in as one. Gabe stared ahead, his eyes fixed on a spot on the wall. He was talking rapidly. Ollie glanced up as they followed each other up the stairs. His brow furrowed.

‘I’m going to have to look in on Ella. Eat some humble pie,’ said Carver without turning round. ‘Remind me to engage my brain before—’ He never got to finish the sentence.

The door to Ella’s bedroom burst open. Olivia ran out, nearly colliding with them both. Her eyes were wide with shock.

‘What?’ Carver gripped both of her arms above the elbow.

‘In there...’ she whispered.

For a few seconds, both men were paralysed, the terrible possibilities of what might be beyond the door rife in their minds.

It was Noah who moved first, steeling himself for what he might see and, for the second time that morning, praying for hope.

Ella’s room was at the front of the house, directly above the parlour. Two double windows with wide striped curtains gave a view of the driveway and any visitors that might appear. Her bed, a large bedstead in dark wood with carved spindles, had belonged to her mother. The décor was simple and crisp, very Ella, white linen with a red toile eiderdown. A French country style couch, upholstered in red-and-cream checks, stood with its back towards the end of the bed. Noah recognised it as the one that had been in the parlour years ago. Ella must have rescued it—she didn’t like to waste a thing.

The housekeeper looked like a small child lying in the huge bed. Her greying hair, normally pinned tight to her head in a serviceable fashion, fanned across the pillow. One arm dangled out of bed, the skin covering it as thin as parchment.

Noah bent to gently take her hand in his. He pressed his fingers to the inside of her wrist. The faintest of flickers.

‘Get an ambulance. Now!’

Carver hovered in the doorway, telling Olivia to go downstairs and stay with Ollie and Gabe. In almost the same breath, he was asking for the emergency services and answering questions in a clipped tone.

Noah tucked Ella’s arm inside the covers and studied her face. Her brow was remarkably smooth for a woman of advancing years, but her lips were far too pale. He pressed his palm against her face. The skin was clammy.

‘What is it?’ Carver appeared at his shoulder, clutching his phone in a tight fist.

It always amazed Noah that in an emergency, people always assumed that a man of the cloth was an expert in medical matters, too. He had once thought to write a paper on it, but had never quite found the time.

‘I’m not sure.’ Noah looked up at the curator. ‘I wish we’d checked earlier.’

‘I do too. But under the circumstances...this can’t all be coincidence, Noah.’

A sudden breeze gusted under the sash window, wafting the thin curtains, carrying the scent of roses and birdsong. Everything outside seemed in complete contrast to what was happening in the house.

‘You go downstairs and check on everyone. I’ll stay with her.’

Noah didn’t object. He knew Carver wanted some time with her before the paramedics arrived. He left the room, glancing back from the hallway. Carver was sitting on the edge of the bed, holding Ella’s hand, telling her to fight.

Five minutes later, the sound of an ambulance siren split the air. Noah gave the paramedics brief details when they entered, as three sets of eyes watched in silence from the snug.

It was only 8.30 a.m.

Chapter Thirty-Six

Beth Davenport listened as the heavy clump of boots sounded on the stairs. People didn’t wear things like that in this house. Ella would be cross.

She stepped back from the door, raising one hand, as though the act of that alone would stop any intruders. She didn’t like strangers. But the steps went in the other direction.

It was a beautiful morning. The strong light poured through her window, casting golden patches of sun on her floor. She stepped into one and twirled like a little girl pretending to be a ballerina, enjoying the warmth on her bare feet.

She felt stronger and quite pleased with herself. During the night, she had woken to find a black and white wing feather on her pillow. Her fingers curled around it and she slept deeply. Now it lay tucked behind her ear, tickling her cheek.

Her bird (she thought of it as hers) had brought her a pink rosebud. It was waiting for her as she slid out of bed, making a funny little warbling sound in its throat. The bud was heady with scent. It made her head spin a little bit, but it told her that was okay, it was bird magic.

She was delighted to have something that belonged to her.

The voices outside sounded serious. She listened as they rose and fell with words she didn’t understand. Her mouth twisted in a little grimace. She hoped they wouldn’t come for her.

Even though the telling of time eluded her now, she could judge from the angle of the sun and the rumbling in her stomach that it was past breakfast time.

The voices and the clumping were going downstairs now. She pressed her face against the door and listened. A sudden rap resounded through the wood and she jumped back with a startled gasp.

‘Beth? It’s Noah. Can I come in?’

She opened the door a tiny bit and peered through. He stood outside holding a tray with a mug of tea and a plate of toast. He looked dishevelled, like a little boy after a day at school.

She opened the door fully and he set the tray down on the round table by the window. His shoulders were hunched up and he wasn’t smiling. Nervously, she twirled a lock of white hair around her finger, wondering if she had done something wrong.

‘I brought your breakfast up, Beth, because things are a little..,’ he paused, ‘..hectic downstairs and I know how you don’t like to be rushed.’ She let out a little sigh. ‘I’ll come up a bit later and we can go for a walk in the garden. Would you like that?’

She nodded, wanting him to leave. Her bird had darted under the bed when he knocked.

Noah watched her from the corner of his eye. She could see him even though he was pretending to focus on gathering last night’s supper things from the nightstand. As he picked up her plate, a knife rolled off and clattered onto the floor. She held her breath as he bent to pick it up.

‘Are you okay, Beth?’ He stood and slid the knife onto the tray. ‘You seem a bit distracted.’

‘I’m hungry,’ she said, which wasn’t quite a lie.

‘Of course. I’ll leave you to your breakfast, then.’ He smiled as he passed her. It seemed to take him a long time to get to the door and go out. She fidgeted until it closed behind him, and then let out a sigh of relief.

Her bird was already perched on the tableside chair with its head cocked to one side. She stroked its white chest and broke off a corner of toast.

‘I’m going to call you Secret,’ she whispered, letting it take the food from her fingers. The bird rubbed its beak along the side of her thumb in approval.

Chapter Thirty-Seven

11a.m. and only three hours since Olivia had discovered Ella, but it had been the longest morning in history.

The paramedics had checked Gabriel over and given him a clean bill of health with the usual warnings—call the hospital if he felt dizzy or sick. They cleaned the graze at the side of his face, which managed to look even angrier after it was swabbed.

Olivia was the first to greet Noah after he came downstairs from delivering Beth’s breakfast. Carver had gone in the ambulance with Ella and told them he would get a taxi back. Olivia hit Noah with multiple questions in quick fire succession, raking her hair away from her face. She hadn’t taken kindly to being told what to do.

Noah had placated them all the best he could, assuring Gabe that Beth was fine, even though she had seemed to be acting a little strangely, which he kept to himself. He put it down to the atmosphere in the house. The mood was subdued. He made breakfast but no one was hungry. He cleared the kitchen because it was something he could do. They were all waiting for Carver’s call from the hospital. When it did come, it was Noah’s phone that rang. He was suddenly scrutinised from all angles.

He listened, holding up his hand to stem any interruptions. The call only lasted a minute. Carver was in the taxi on his way back and the signal wavered as he neared the valley.

‘Well?’ Olivia spoke first, sliding down from the stool by the breakfast bar. Gabe sat by Ollie. He was doodling absentmindedly on a piece of paper, but he lifted his eyes and Noah recognised the emotion. Fear.

‘It’s a heart attack, but she’s stable.’

‘Jeez,’ Ollie gasped. ‘I thought Ella would go on forever. I can’t remember her ever having a day off sick.’ And it was true; Ella was made of ‘fine stock’, as she would have said. She rarely even had a cold.

‘What happens now?’ asked Olivia. She was, as always, right to the point.

‘Tests. Lots of them. And depending on what they find, they might have to transfer her to the city hospital. Her sister is on her way. But Ella is in good hands so don’t worry.’

Five minutes later, the front door opened. Carver came through, a sheen of sweat on his brow.

‘She’s sedated. There’s nothing more I can do right now.’ He glanced at Noah. ‘I needed to be home. Olivia, can you come to my office in half an hour?’

She looked up and studied him. Ollie sat up straight, his shoulders tense, anticipating more fireworks. Olivia pulled her hair over one shoulder and nodded before striding from the kitchen, passing Carver so close their sleeves touched. Noah half expected to see sparks flying.

Carver turned on his heel without saying a word. The sound of floorboards creaking and the slight slamming of a door upstairs told them he had gone to his room. Gabe looked up at the ceiling as though he could see right through it. ‘Is this where they each hold battle plans with their generals?’

No one found any humour in his words.

‘I suggest we all retire and clean up,’ said Noah quietly, ‘and try and make the rest of the day as normal as we can.’

***

Gabriel swiped his hand across the misted bathroom mirror and ran his fingers over the scratches on his face. The pressure from the shower spray had stung and he’d had a moment of panic as flashes of the bird in the cellar had come flooding back. He pushed his wet hair away from his face to get a better look. He saw it then, the same face shape as Beth. He shook his head and let some fall back over his brow.

His room had always been a place of solitude, somewhere he could retreat to if the house got crazy or if he simply needed some thinking time. But he missed his old attic room with the slope of the ceiling over his bed and the old, draughty window, which gave him a bird’s eye view of the back garden. It was small, but it was home. Maybe later he could start moving his stuff back up there. The thought gave him the first glimmer of joy he’d felt all day.

His phone told him more than an hour had elapsed since he had left the others; Noah had fussed that he really shouldn’t be by himself, even though he had suggested it. Gabe had replied, stating he didn’t need an escort, particularly in the shower.

Pulling on clean clothes should have made him more mentally prepared for the rest of the day, but it didn’t. He had been right when he told Ollie something had changed in the house. Events had proved that. A niggling doubt crept into his mind that Ella’s heart attack wasn’t a coincidence.

Along the corridor, a door opened quickly and then slammed shut. The noise made the glass in his mirror tremble.

‘I told you I didn’t take anything from the vault! How could I? I don’t even know the fucking code!’ Olivia’s voice was filled with indignant fury. ‘If you don’t trust me, then fine—I’m gone.’

Gabe wondered whether he ought to open the door then decided he was safer inside. His brow knitted in concentration. What was all this about the vault? There had been someone down there, he had heard them, so was Olivia lying?

There were so many questions careering around his head. He placed his hands over his face and screwed up his eyes, hoping the dark would give him some clarity. But it didn’t.

‘Olivia!’ Carver’s voice now, outside his door. She must have gone downstairs. ‘I had to ask. I’m asking everyone. Don’t take it so God damn personally.’ His voice shook with barely suppressed anger. Gabe couldn’t remember a time when the curator had lost control—apart from the incident when Gabe was nine and had decided to try driving Carver’s beloved MG along the drive, and had crashed it into the brick pillar at the side of the gate. But that was only a momentary spark. Noah had said it was more about Gabe’s safety than anything else.

Gabe opened the door and looked out. Carver stood at the head of the stairs. He had changed into a pale grey linen suit and a white shirt, his hair still damp from the shower but all in place. His appearance said control.

‘You didn’t ask me.’ Gabe hadn’t even known he was going to say that. It just blurted out.

The older man’s eyes wheeled around and for an instant, Gabe was caught in his furious, pale blue stare. Then they softened.

‘About the time this occurred, you were flat on your back in the dirt, so I can rule you out.’

The front door slammed shut.

‘And Gabriel,’ said Carver, ‘your penchant for listening to other people’s conversations is going to come back and bite you one day.’

The sound of an engine being brutally gunned to life and car tyres spinning on gravel.

Carver sighed. ‘I was hoping she wouldn’t do that.’

‘She’ll come back. You know what she’s like.’ Gabe wanted to add that he was sure Olivia was telling the truth, but he couldn’t.

‘I wish I had your faith. This time, I’m not so sure she even wants to come back. Or maybe only to pack her bags. Damn.’ Carver clasped his hand around the balcony handrail.

He’s trying to hold onto something, Gabe thought.

For a few moments, neither of them spoke. Gabe’s eyes trailed to the high window overlooking the landing. The sky was no longer bright blue, but an odd shade of grey. A single, small patch of blue still hung there, like God had opened one eye to spy on them.

‘A storm’s coming,’ he said. His mouth felt like sandpaper.

‘In more ways than one, Gabe. In more ways than one.’

Gabe watched as Carver went downstairs. Had he started all of this off with his need to poke around in the past? Only a few days ago, he had wanted to be seen as more adult and to be in charge of his own destiny. Now he would give anything to turn the clock back.

Chapter Thirty-Eight

The afternoon passed in a slow grind. After a spell in the garden, the stifling heat drove them indoors to what was known as The White Room. It was a strange name considering most of the furnishings were grey or cream, but the overall appearance was bright and uplifting. Carver was trying to keep them all buoyant. The room faced south with a broad view of the lawn, which led down to the fountain. Floor to ceiling windows on two sides added to its brightness. A large, low table commandeered the centre of the room, surrounded by a dove grey sofa and two cream armchairs opposite. An imposing white marble fireplace with a club fender, upholstered in grey velvet, graced the back wall.

Ollie was the quietest, having heard his sister’s outburst from downstairs. He’d been emptying the dishwasher whilst Noah was checking the jam cellar for any signs of forced entry. Olivia had left without saying a word to him which cut deep, and the knowledge someone had taken something from the vault made him feel guilty, because he had been planning to take Gabe in there only last night. Noah had asked him if he had any idea about what had happened, just after Olivia had slammed the door so hard it had rocked on its hinges.

Ollie was a terrible liar. He was the one who always got into trouble because Liv could convince anyone she hadn’t touched the biscuit jar, even with tell-tale crumbs around her mouth. But he knew nothing about what had happened earlier, so there was no lie to be told.

He watched over the top of his book as Carver paced the length of the room, his head bowed in thought. Ollie knew him well enough to know he was waiting for the right time to speak, whenever that was. That moment came when Gabe left to grab something from his room.

‘There’s something you should know, Ollie, but this isn’t for Gabe’s ears. Remember the box from the Davenports? The one Noah found on the lawn? I kept it. That’s what was in the safety box in the vault.’ Ollie had been expecting something important, but this came right out of nowhere and hit him like a sucker punch.

‘So that’s what you think Olivia took?’ He had to force his lips to form words as his brain raced. ‘I swear she didn’t know about it. She would have told me.’

‘Would have told you what?’ Gabe hovered in the doorway with a book under his arm.

Ollie cut in. ‘If she had taken anything out of the vault.’

Carver shot a relieved glance in his direction, then frowned.

Gabe set his book down on a side table. ‘I’m getting a drink. Does anyone want one?’

Ollie asked for a sparkling water and Gabe went off to the kitchen.

‘For now, we don’t say anything to him about what was in the vault. Agreed?’

A niggle of uncertainty sparked in Ollie’s gut. ‘Wouldn’t it be better if we all knew?’

‘Gabe is freaked out enough about what happened in the cellar. I want to find out what happened to the box before telling him the thing he thought was gone and that started off the whole sorry mess with his family, is the thing that has inexplicably disappeared.’

Chapter Thirty-Nine

A thorn of guilt lodged itself under Noah’s skin. He was the one who had left the vault door open. And he was disturbed that no one had admitted to taking it, which only left one possibility. The feel of the box in his hands all those years ago...there wasn’t an adjective on earth to describe it.

He stood on the threshold of the French doors, letting the breeze cool his skin. The sky was now the colour of steel, the beautiful morning spoiled. A heavy, oppressive quality filled the air as though the day was brooding. Even the birds had stopped singing. He watched as a single leaf fluttered down from the cherry tree—the promise of autumn.

‘You want to ask what we’re waiting for, don’t you?’ Carver appeared at his shoulder. Despite the heat, the older man still wore his jacket. Noah had often teased him that he was born in the wrong century.

‘I do.’ A faint rumble of thunder grumbled far to the east. ‘I’m trying to convince myself you know what you’re doing.’

There was a wry smile on Carver’s lips. ‘Truthfully, Noah, I’m not sure what we’re dealing with here. But nightfall will tell us. I’m working on the Sherlock Holmes methodology.’

Noah half laughed.

‘The process of elimination. Part of me wants to believe someone did take that box and they’re not telling, and that Gabe’s fall had nothing at all to do with anything that crawled out of the woodwork. Then all we’re dealing with is a liar and a random incident. But my gut tells me there’s a chain reaction here and we’re only just starting. Stupidly enough, I want something to show itself because at least then, I’ll know what I’m dealing with—and if it’s related to Gabe.’

‘I don’t think there’s any if involved. Whatever targeted the Davenports all those years ago has come back for Gabe, and maybe Beth. It has a score to settle.’

‘For a man of God, that’s one hell of a statement.’ Carver put his hand on the priest’s shoulder. ‘Thank you for staying with me, Noah. I need your faith. We need your faith.’

‘Only you could put God and hell in one sentence, my friend.’ He placed his hand over Carver’s. ‘What about Olivia?’

‘I want her home by dusk, but she’s not answering her phone. Not even for Ollie. So, all we can do is wait.’

Noah voiced a thought that refused to be silenced. ‘The magpie was the only bird that didn’t sing or comfort Jesus at the crucifixion. Some people are convinced that they’re cursed. The old myths say they carry a drop of the devil’s blood under their tongue. Is it coincidence that’s what attacked Gabe?’

The curator’s lips twisted into a hard smile. ‘Everything is playing out here for a reason.’

His answer didn’t make Noah feel any better.

***

Ollie and Gabe were slouched on the grey sofa, playing chess on Ollie’s tablet, as the two men came inside. At the sight of the two teenagers studying a game that had endured for centuries, Carver smiled. The first genuine smile of the day.

The Manor was a classic case of a time warp. On the exterior, it looked like a house that might be found on a Sunday night television drama. On the inside, it was an eclectic mix of styles, some as old fashioned as the grandfather clock in the hallway, and some as modern as the state of the art computer system throughout the house—and of course, the vault. Victorian ran into Edwardian, ran into Art Deco. Original oils of horses and dogs that were once part of everyday life hung alongside parchments depicting ancient Egyptian mythology and Pagan spell charts. Artefacts lay in unnatural surroundings: a skeleton of a Halloween carousel horse on the polished mahogany top of a bureau, a wooden witch’s ladder hung in the corner of the Shaker style kitchen. But somehow, it all worked. The house seemed to absorb each piece and make it part of the whole.

As the afternoon slid into early evening, there was still no sign of Olivia. Ella’s sister, June, had rung to say the tests they had done had proved inconclusive, and they were moving Ella to the city hospital in the morning. Carver had taken another grilling from June when he suggested he and Noah pop over. June made it perfectly clear she thought Ella worked far too hard for too little reward. It did nothing to lighten the mood.

No one was hungry, but Noah kept bringing snacks from the kitchen, the latest of which—a toasted cheese sandwich—lay on plates on the low table. Gabe prodded an ooze of melted cheese with his finger. Ollie watched him over the top of his glasses.

The French doors stood open in hope of a breath of cool air, but all was still. The sky had turned from a gloomy grey to a dirty yellow-beige. Somewhere, the sun was setting.

Gabe stood and stretched, arching his shoulders back with the grace of youth. He made for the door.

‘Where are you going?’ Carver put down his newspaper.

‘The bathroom.’

Carver’s reply was stalled by a glance from Noah. ‘Just be vigilant, Gabe, please.’

***

Gabe acknowledged the priest’s concern with a raise of his hand. It was approaching 8 p.m. and the house seemed unnaturally quiet, as if it, too, was waiting for something. Even the floorboards appeared asleep as he crossed the landing to his room.

He shut the door and leaned against it, feeling the welcome chill from the wood on his brow. The air in his lungs came whistling out as though he had been holding it in all day. He opened his mouth and rocked his lower jaw from side to side. It ached from being clenched. The covers on his bed lay in a heap from this morning. Of course, Ella hadn’t been in to tidy up...a small lump formed in his throat. It was stiflingly hot. Then he remembered shutting his window this morning—was it really only this morning?—after seeing the bird. He knew instinctively it was the same bird that had attacked him.

The wood around the window had swelled in the heat and he had to push hard to lift the sash. Gabe leaned out and inhaled the unmistakable scent of ozone. He glanced to the right. His mother’s window was wide open, too. Beth had been more than happy to stay in her room all day, even declining a walk in the garden with Noah in the afternoon. Carver had said not to worry; she was probably still unnerved by her visit to the farmhouse. The curator didn’t say anything about the ghost of Stu Davenport, but his omission hung there unseen, like the ghost itself.

High in the sky, a curve of moon interrupted the coming twilight, as though it couldn’t wait to appear. The North Star twinkled a greeting. Gabe wondered if this was officially night, or did he have to wait until the sky was dark. He rocked on the windowsill, letting his weight take him slightly off balance, feeling the adrenaline spike through his veins.

A small bird darted close to his face and he let go with one hand as its wingtips touched his cheek, a cry of panic shooting from his mouth. The swallow disappeared into its nest of twigs, its beak filled with squirming grubs. Gabe wondered again, this time about what it felt like to be one of those squirming grubs. He slid down onto his knees on the bed, his courage swirling away like water down a drain. He was afraid.

Gabe had been brought up in this house. He knew dark things that couldn’t be explained by men or science existed. When most children were ready for Harry Potter, he was digesting The Encyclopaedia of Modern Witchcraft. Once, a presence had passed right through him, causing little bubbles to explode inside his stomach. He had worked long into the night with a restorer, picking dead lice from a banner used on the fields of Culloden, and had seen the dried blood of men who had died terrible deaths. But despite what happened on that snowy night long ago, nothing evil had ever touched him since. On nights when he was bored, he had sometimes wished for it, something to prove he was here in this house for a reason.

But what if wishes came true?

Chapter Forty

The vampire returned to The Manor the following evening as soon as the sun set, as he knew he would. Truth be told, he could venture out as it slid towards the horizon—but it wasn’t comfortable. The light made his eyes stream.

The two young vampires who shared his den had pleaded with him to bring a human home before he left. He hadn’t sired them; he had only taken them under his wing a few years ago. The scent on his skin from the human boy caused the weaker one to press against him like a cat claiming ownership. They were fixated on blood as the young always were, but he hunted for them most nights. It was easier that way. He didn’t need the attention of a messy kill and he forbade them to hunt indiscriminately. They knew the price they would pay if they did.

They must stay in their den tonight, he had told them before leaving. They knew better than to argue, even though they hovered in the doorway of the stone crypt, hoping he would change his mind. But tonight wasn’t a night for teaching. Five minutes later, he returned with a small roe deer struggling in his hand. Its legs kicked and flailed against his thigh, but he felt nothing. Their forms waited in the darkness, milling around the doorway. Their need was palpable. They fell upon the deer as one. He had forgotten the monstrous rage of young hunger.

Now he stood in almost the same spot as last night. It was pointless to try and hide his presence from the entity inside. It would know as surely as he. Predators acknowledged each other in the wild.

A loud rumble of thunder rolled through the heavens and far away, the stark flash of lightning. Electricity sizzled in the air. He pulled his hood over his head, not for the threat of rain, but to be at one with the dark. It was an old friend now, although in the past it had bruised and bloodied him nearly to the point of extinction.

The sticky heat clung to everything. It carried scents from the garden and from within the house—the saccharine smell of honeysuckle, a sour odour from an open grate at the side of the house, the scent of beeswax from within the rooms. And of course, the many nuances of the human inhabitants—the falseness of soap and cologne, the heavy aroma of blood with all its singular sweetness. But there was another smell drifting from the open window up above. The prickling stench of fear.

The vampire paused, pressing himself against the tall guard of a clump of evergreens. The boy stared out the window, his face pale against the darkness of the room. He was the fear.

High above, the vampire caught the tremor in the air from the beat of wings. The moon, now set in place and covered by cloud, cast only a ghost light, but there was enough for him to pick out the hard glassiness of an eye staring down. The bird screeched. It was an inhuman sound.

The open window slammed closed and the face disappeared. The vampire mused, adding knowledge to the slate in his mind. So, the boy knew of the threat. He was gone from the trees before the ripple of noise had settled into the night.

Chapter Forty-One

Noah was halfway up the stairs when Gabriel came out of his room. The priest stopped, not sure whether he should continue and make some excuse as to where he was heading. He was very aware Gabe didn’t want babysitting, but one look at the boy’s ashen face was enough to keep him in one place.

‘The bird’s outside. I heard it.’

‘Come downstairs.’ Noah held out one hand and was startled when Gabe grasped it. His fingers were ice cold.

Ollie and Carver had moved to the front parlour. The curator stood by the bay window staring out. Rain hammered against the glass, running down in dark rivulets. A lightning bolt struck the valley, illuminating the whole hillside for a brief moment.

Ollie sat on the arm of a chair, his phone pressed to his ear. ‘Fuck it! It just goes straight to voice mail. She must know I’m out of my mind.’ The outburst was uncharacteristic, but everyone felt his anguish.

Gabriel threw himself down on the couch and plugged his earphones into his phone. He pulled at the lobe of one ear.

A door slammed shut somewhere in the house and everyone jerked round.

‘Noah, please bring Beth down here, too.’ Carver’s voice was low, as if he only wanted the occupants of the room to hear it.

‘She was sleeping...’ Noah began, and then he stopped and sprinted up the stairs. The slow blink of the moon shone through the arched window, and then was obscured by a scud of cloud. The wind, which had begun with a lazy breeze, was now rampaging around the exterior of the house, whistling through gaps in the old bricks and lashing the rain against any exposed surface. Something large swept past the window and Noah ducked down before realising it was the sun parasol that covered the picnic table. No one had thought to take it down with the threat of a storm. Ella would have remembered...

A verse from the Gospel of St. Mark came to mind. Some demons are so strong they require a level of faith to cast them out—prayer and fasting and faith in each other. His faith was hiding somewhere beneath his fear. And their faith in each other? Olivia’s image swam before his eyes, her face rigid with anger as she had left this morning. Gabe’s voice imploring them he wasn’t in shock, that the bird had attacked him.

Noah didn’t even bother knocking at Beth’s door. He barged through. The gauze curtains at her window billowed inwards like ghosts and the floor underneath was dark with rain. A bolt of lightning sparked overhead and the room erupted in a blinding glare of light.

Noah’s heart plummeted.

The bed was empty.

He stared in disbelief. For the second time in two days, Beth had vanished. He ran to the open window and his feet went from underneath him. His hip took most of the impact, but he ignored the jarring pain and scrambled to his knees, pulling himself up with the ledge of the windowsill. The rain beat down on his knuckles, far too icy for late summer. Noah leaned out into the storm and at once, his breath was taken.

‘Noah?...Good God, where’s Beth?’ Carver stood in the doorway. ‘I heard a thud. I called you but you didn’t answer.’

Noah backed into the room. His face stung where the rain had lashed down. ‘I slipped in the water, but never mind about that. She’s gone again, Edward. How?’

The two men faced each other. Noah swiped his wet hair away from his face and grasped the back of his neck.

‘She can’t have come down the stairs,’ said Carver. ‘We were all there at some point. And even if she did, she couldn’t have opened the door. I locked it.’

Noah arched an eyebrow. Carver only locked the door at night. Crime was rare in the village and none of the locals would attempt to break in. They all knew strange things went on behind the doors, but Carver was well liked and generous to a fault at charity events.

‘She can’t have gone out of the window. It’s impossible....’ Noah’s voice trailed off as both men came up with the possibility that she had simply vanished.

‘Grab some flashlights; we’ll do a sweep of the grounds just in case.’ Carver’s face was grim. ‘She can’t have gone far.’

Something clicked deep inside Noah’s mind. It slid into place like a piece of a puzzle. Grabbing Carver’s arm, he stopped him from running downstairs. ‘It’s baiting us, don’t you see? It’s trying to separate us all because it knows it can’t take us all down at once.’ A trickle of water ran down his face. It looked like tears.

The truth in Noah’s words stopped Carver in his tracks. The curator pressed his palm over his eyes for a moment.

Noah grabbed his arm. ‘Are you okay?’

Carver waved his hand away. ‘If that revelation was God helping us out, I may become a born again Christian, my friend.’ They descended the steps. Just before they entered the drawing room, Carver leaned close. ‘It was in my head, before we came down. I don’t know how, but it was.’

This admission did nothing to help Noah’s state of mind. An image popped up like a jack-in-the-box. They were all waiting like little ducks in a row at a fairground. Waiting for something to pull the trigger.

‘Beth?’ Gabe leapt up, a frown deepening as he saw the empty space behind them.

Carver opened his mouth to speak, and at that precise moment, a clap of thunder rolled over the top of the house. The noise was deafening. The timbers of the great house shook and the glass in the windows rattled in their frames. A flash of lightning illuminated the room in a strange blue-white glow. Gabe’s hair lifted from his head as static charged the room. The thunder crashed again, bringing another bolt of jagged lightning from the sky. Eyes wheeled towards the bay window as if they were all in one body. The bolt hit the beech tree by the wall to the lane. There was a stretched-out creaking as though the bones of the old tree were being ripped apart, a smell of burning wood, and then they watched in horror as the great tree gave up its struggle and crashed to the ground. The foundations of the house shivered as the tremor ran through them.

The lights in the house flickered, causing their features to blur and shadow. Finally, Carver spoke. ‘It’s right over the driveway. There’s no way anything can get in. Or out.’

Gabe remained silent as Noah told him and Ollie what he had found in Beth’s room, or rather, what he hadn’t found. Gabe sat twisting the cord on his earphones and occasionally rubbing his right hand. Noah also told them his theory about being baited, and the voice in Carver’s head. This wasn’t the time for secrets. Carver had gone upstairs to check the server room after the lightning bolt. It was no surprise to any of them when he reappeared and shook his head.

‘We stay together, whatever happens.’

‘But what about Beth? We can’t just leave her out there.’ Ollie voiced a question they all were thinking.

‘She might not even be out there, Ollie. At this point, we just don’t know. She could be hiding because of the storm. Do you remember when Ella couldn’t find her last Christmas? To this day we don’t know where she was, but she was fine. If I thought searching outside would yield any success, I’d be ahead of anyone.’ Carver paced the floor behind the sofa with his hands clasped behind his back. Noah knew he was never one to contemplate difficult situations standing still. But he also knew that Carver was placating Ollie and Gabe.

Gabriel didn’t say anything. Noah watched as the boy stared at a knot in the wooden floor, his dark hair obscuring the graze on the side of his cheek.

‘Gabe? Penny for them?’

The boy glanced up and tried to smile. Noah thought it was about the saddest thing he had ever seen.

‘I left my iPad in the White Room. Just let me grab it.’

Carver glanced over and gave Noah a questioning look.

The priest put on what he hoped was an authoritative tone. ‘Thirty seconds, Gabe. Or I’ll be on your case.’

Chapter Forty-Two

The White Room was down the corridor towards the kitchen, past the music room on the right, then turn right in the direction of the cellar, veering off to take the first door on the left. Gabriel had lived in this house for so long, he could have done it blindfolded. Everything was so familiar, yet not. The sounds from the storm were masking things he took for granted—the soft chime of the grandfather clock as it struck a quarter to the hour, Radio Four filtering out from Carver’s suite, other music floating from an upstairs room. But no one played music today.

Whatever was out there had taken Beth. He felt it on a cellular level and he didn’t know how he would cope if anything happened to her. Not just Beth. She’s your mother, Gabriel, a voice whispered against his ear. He turned in the stillness of the hallway, the breath still warm against his lobe, expecting to see—someone.

His iPad lay on the grey sofa where he’d left it. He picked it up, aware of the dark pressing in against the glass of the windows and doors. The curtains hadn’t been drawn and his reflection stared back. His eyes seemed as black as the night, two dark holes in his face, carved into a pale surface. His limbs seemed too long for his body, as though overnight, something had seeped into his bones and was lengthening them like on a rack. Gabriel shivered.

He wondered where Olivia was and how Ella was doing. A burning sensation began to flow through his veins at the injustice of it all. Beth might be out there hidden from view, scared and confused, and he couldn’t do anything about it. His blood thumped around his body in great, rapid heartbeats and he wanted to scream. A sudden thought, dangerous and careless, erupted into his brain, as though it had been borne of his frustration.

Gabe dropped the tablet onto a cushion and walked towards the French doors. His reflection walked towards him too. He idly wondered that if they met in the middle, would one cancel the other out? His hands closed on the metal of the door handles, one firm downward push of his fingers and they would open, allowing the dark to rush in. If something out there wanted him, and he was in no doubt that he was the one at the top of the list, maybe it would leave everyone else alone. It would be worth the sacrifice.

Gabriel raised his eyes and stared into his mirror image—but somehow it wasn’t his own eyes gazing at him, but the eyes of a stranger. The tall man had his hands on the handles on the outside of the door, stopping Gabriel from opening them. The boy jumped back as though an electric shock had shot through the metal. The stranger seemed part of the night, so dark was his clothing. Only his face held any light. He held one slender finger up to his lips.

‘Gabe.’ Ollie stood in the doorway. ‘Come on, you shouldn’t be alone.’

Gabriel spun round, and his eyes went back to the doors.

The stranger had vanished. And Ollie hadn’t seen him.

Chapter Forty-Three

Olivia Taverner had spent the day racing around the narrow country lanes at a speed that should have thrown her into a ditch—or worse, the path of an oncoming vehicle.

She couldn’t remember a time where she had been this angry. Or this hurt. Hot headed was a phrase often used to describe her fly-off-the-handle outbursts. What she was feeling, people saw, so unlike her brother who didn’t like to show any emotion until he had processed it first. She knew he must be worried sick, but approximately four minutes and one mile away from The Manor, she had lowered the window of her car door and pitched her phone onto the side of the road. The noise it made as it hit the solid ground was stupidly satisfying. She was still smarting from the dressing down Carver had given her the night before, and this combined with a restless night’s sleep, and the accusation this morning had been the final straw. Why did he think she had taken anything from the vault? Why not one of the others? She could only assume he really didn’t trust her anymore, and that stung.

Before arriving at The Manor, she had never found anywhere she truly fit in. Life had dealt both her and Ollie a shitty start by taking away their parents and enabling them with unique ‘talents’. So unique that no foster family wanted them around for long, and you could forget about the A word—adoption.

In the past four years, she had never been happier, even with the occasional run-ins with Carver or Noah. Finally, there was a place where she wasn’t special, she was just herself. Carver was the father figure she had never had, although she would never tell him that. And now to think he could blame her for taking something out of the fucking vault hit every exposed nerve in her body.

Plus, there was still that thing with the ghost. Thinking of him as Beth’s late husband and Gabe’s father made him seem far too personal. She didn’t like her spirits so close.

After a day where she had gone through a full tank of fuel and stopped at every coffee shop along the way, she was finally starting to cool down. The passenger footwell of her car was littered with a flotsam of white paper cups and a crumpled-up pack of twenty cigarettes. Not that she even smoked. But she had bought them at a petrol station that morning, along with a disposable lighter, had lit one by the side of the road and coughed her way through it. Two miles further along, she had leant out of the door and thrown up about a litre of coffee. The rest of the pack she crushed in her hands and flung with a scream of frustration into the footwell.

As she brooded, she decided what to do. The darkening sky did nothing to improve her mood and when the first fat drops of rain fell onto her windscreen, she stopped and got out, lifting her face to the sky and letting the droplets stream down her face. She tried to cry and couldn’t.

The thunder rolling around the hills seemed fitting. She stood with her hands clenched tight and her fingernails digging into her palms and let the noise reverberate into her chest.

Dusk fell early with the storm-filled sky and there were no other cars on the road. Everyone would be tucked up at home, watching safely from inside. Coming around the bend before the burnt-out farmhouse, a cat shot across the road in front of her and she braked, her seatbelt locking so quickly it sent a wave of pain from her shoulder to her hip. The cat leapt into the hedgerow, its green eyes glinting with contempt. She lowered her window.

‘Stupid fucking animal!’ The venom in her voice shocked her.

The cat arched its back and hissed, then ducked into the field beyond.

Olivia could smell burning, but it wasn’t the smell of wood. She climbed out of the car and wrinkled her nose—she’d been meaning to get it checked out.

The top roofline of the cottage, or what was left of it, poked miserably over the hedgerow. Far away, a burst of lightning lit the tops of the hills with an eerie, blue glow. Olivia pushed her hair out of her face as the growing wind tried to whip it into knots.

Slowly, and without really knowing why, she walked the short distance to the farmhouse gate. A small flock of birds swooped up from behind the cottage then wheeled as one into a clump of trees in the paddock beyond. She should look for shelter, too, or try to nurse her abused car back to The Manor. She could go down Fairly Hill. Yes, it was steep, but nothing would be coming the other way, and it would cut a good mile off the actual distance home. Home. That simple word hurt her more than anything Carver could have thrown in her direction.

She opened the gate and went through, her feet slipping slightly on the wet shingle path. A single buttercup covered in ash drooped between the edging stones. The wind whipped fragments of burnt wood dust into her face and she covered her mouth and nose with one hand. All of her anger had drained away, leaving only a dull sense of numbed acceptance. The sorry mess of the farmhouse loomed before her. This was insane. It was a ticking time bomb, ready to collapse at any given moment. If she died, would Ollie know immediately?

‘Help me,’ she whispered against her palm, truly not knowing whom it was for.

The door to the farmhouse had been devoured by the flames and beyond lay the blackened remains of what looked like a boiler. Her foot bumped against a solid object and she dug her fingers into a charred pile of ash, closing on something metal. She pulled it out and wiped it across the front of her jeans. The storm crept closer. Lightning lit the sky over the village itself and the rooftops flickered in stark relief. Her eyes dropped to the object in her hand. In the glow, she saw a door knocker. It was in the shape of a lion’s face.

The wind dropped suddenly, as if someone up above had flicked a switch. Olivia turned slowly as the hairs in the nape of her neck began to prickle. By the gate, a form flickered. It had some substance but she could see right through it.

Oh God, what if this was what had been here when Gabe was a baby? Terror turned her blood to ice.

The form hovered and quivered like the shimmer of summer heat over a long, empty road and then harnessed itself to the pathway. It floated from side to side like a balloon on a string that had become snagged. Instinct told her to run, but she couldn’t move. Never again would she laugh when hearing the phrase ‘rooted to the spot’.

The form elongated and she could make out a hazy figure of a man, although she could still see the bars of the gate through him. He was like an undeveloped black-and-white photograph.

Behind her, the darkened ruin of the house blocked her way. Olivia was, by all accounts, trapped.

The form floated towards her, skimming over the path. It was the shape she had seen in the house when Beth was here; it was Gabe’s father.

His face bore an expression of startled disbelief, his eyes wide with shock and his mouth slightly open in an ‘O’ of bewilderment. Shreds of clothing clung to him, occasionally lifting and drifting as though caught in some invisible body of water. He came closer, holding out his hands like a blind man. Olivia caught the scent of petrol and wet dirt. She shrunk back half an inch, still holding the door knocker like a talisman. This was the first time in all of her sightings that a ghost had tried to make contact with her and she was terrified. No amount of research and papers and glimpses could have prepared her for the absolute fear that turned her legs to stone.

The figure that had been Stu Davenport stopped. A dark line formed in the haze of his brow. He was concentrating. Olivia forced his name through half frozen lips and the line deepened. His chin descended, lowering his head. He was nodding.

A gasp of breath left her lungs in a long, drawn-out exhalation.

‘....Bethhhhh...’ A sound belched from deep within him, twisting out of his mouth in a rancid, rolling gasp. She had to fight the gag reflex welling up in her throat.

‘She’s safe,’ Olivia blurted out, not sure how much he would understand. Did ghosts even have understanding? She vowed that if she got out of this intact, she would make it her life’s work to find out. ‘And Gabe. Gabriel. Your son.’

The figure held out one hand and touched the lion’s form in her hand. The fingers were at an odd angle, as though they had been smashed and left to heal like that. The hand dropped and fell right through her own. Olivia snatched her hand back and clutched it to her chest.

An expression she could only say was pure sadness appeared on his face. A wave of empathy stemmed the terror in her throat. This man had met a sudden and traumatic death whilst on the way home to his wife and baby. He sensed they were in trouble and had carried that awful feeling to his grave and beyond. He was nothing to fear.

His form pulsed, fading into the darkness and splitting into disjointed parts.

‘No, don’t go! Please!’ She held out her own hands wanting to grab hold of him and tether him to this earth for a few more minutes. Something was pulling him back, back towards the plane he travelled.

A wail of despair erupted from him and he locked his eyes to hers. As another roll of thunder boomed overhead, he splintered into hundreds of pieces and was gone. But she had heard the words he’d forced from his mouth before his silent scream.

Sheets of rain fell from the sky. By the time she had run to her car, she was soaked to the skin. She raged at herself for dumping her phone that morning. She needed to talk to Carver, to Noah, to be back at The Manor. She ducked into her seat and the wind took the door from her hands and slammed it shut. Water ran down her windscreen like a waterfall. Maybe she could limp home if she was very careful.

Her engine spluttered to life and, flicking her wipers on double speed, she pulled out, heading north where the left hand turn to Fairly Hill branched off from the lane. It was a road only the locals knew about, not much more than a cars width, but it had passing places. She hoped nothing would be coming the other way.

The front of her car wanted to veer off to the left; she had to fight the steering wheel to keep straight. Her fingers ached as she clutched it. Her hair clung to her face like strands of seaweed. Please, please, let me make it back...

Just as she turned at the junction, she saw lights in the distance. It was Tom and Betty’s farmhouse. Should she call in there and phone? She slowed, weighing up her options. They might not even be in. It could be just security lights in the yard, and that would put about another mile on her journey. She couldn’t risk it.

Her headlights split the darkness, the beams arcing as the hill swung left, then right, then left again. She crawled around the bends, struggling with the steering, and aware that a grinding noise from the left suspension was getting louder as metal fought metal.

Nothing mattered but what was in front of her. Her shoulders ached with tension and her jaw was clamped so tight that her teeth physically hurt. The hill dipped then climbed to its highest point. From there, it was a crazy sequence of bends before it hit the road that led to The Manor.

Her beams rose into the darkness as she crested the hill. Far below to her left, the village lay in a cluster of tiny lights like a small slice of the Milky Way had fallen to earth. Sheets of lightning sprayed the night sky and rolls of thunder so loud her ears rang from one peal to the next.

She braked as the car began to descend, aware that the road was so wet, she could see rivers running down the edges. Her tyres scrabbled for grip and she flung it into second gear as she rounded the sharpest curve. Her headlights lit up the hedgerow as the car spun slightly. Olivia fought the slide, jamming on her handbrake in an attempt to stop, but her car had zero traction. The left hand wheel hit a huge pothole covered in water and the car lurched and bottomed, then something snapped and the steering wheel became light in her hands.

The car gained momentum as its weight carried it downhill. At the next bend, the right hand back wing clipped the edge of the black-and white chevron sign, sending it into a spin. Olivia let go of the wheel and covered her head with her crossed arms. Through a small space on the windscreen, everything flashed past like a speeded-up carousel ride.

Out of nowhere, a piebald bird appeared, its white-tipped wings outstretched in a predator’s glide. Its small black eyes looked right through her. Olivia’s car slid sideways and lost its valiant fight with the road. Her world tipped upside down in a flurry of breaking glass, and everything went black.

Chapter Forty-Four

Beth was such a willing victim.

Aka Maga congratulated itself. She had proved to be more useful alive than dead, and her childlike innocence and capitulation were far too delicious to simply kill. She was ripe and ready for corruption. Beth could prove to be the arrow in its bow.

Discovering that Carver still held the wooden box had vexed Aka Maga to the point of blind fury. It didn’t want an open reminder of the centuries it had spent imprisoned. The box was a fearful place and Aka Maga was not prepared to take the chance of being tricked into dwelling there again. But it could not take it in its present form, and abandoning the bird to take on a more appropriate host was not an option.

Finding Noah in the vault had proved to be very fortuitous. Aka Maga had watched from its perch on a rafter as the priest had entered. It had smelt his fear and fed on it, hungrily. This man had spoilt the taking of the child all those years ago and Aka Maga held onto grudges. It loathed the men who stood for religion.

Discovering Gabriel in the kitchen surpassed even the twisted joy it felt about Beth. The scent of the boy drifted through the airbricks, sleep dusty and pungent in its teenage state. This was the perfect point at which to claim him, just before he passed across into adulthood and so became forbidden. But Aka Maga wanted them all to suffer, so it swallowed its own greed and desires and stole out of the main cellar. It would terrorise them to the point where they would give the boy to it willingly, just to make it stop.

An open window gave it entry to the boot room where it slid its plan into action. It could still taste Gabriel’s blood on its tongue even now.

The aftermath of the boy’s fall brought a wonderful chaos to the house. Aka Maga fluttered into Beth’s room and woke her by preening the soft strands of white hair across her face. It had whispered in her ear about what it needed her to do and she had gone about it willingly. It wondered if she might have flashes of recollection, but her memory had erased the trauma of it entirely. Aka Maga appreciated the twisted irony behind that.

Getting Beth to climb out of the window had been as easy as gaining her trust. It had asked her and she had agreed, running to the window in her haste to please her bird, her Secret. She had laughed as she sat astride the ledge, one leg dangling barefoot against the sun-warmed bricks, and she had negotiated the tangle of climbing honeysuckle with the grace of a ten-year-old child. No fear, only the joy of accomplishment.

Aka Maga pondered as to her state of dress as the storm approached. With no shoes and only a thin, white dress and fringed shawl she could fall foul of the elements. It would be unfortunate if she perished, but given the plan it had, her survival seemed impossible.

The blame would fall entirely on the vampire, a fact that brought a sense of satisfaction. The blood drinker would rue the night it had decided to interfere. Aka Maga understood that a very fine line divided it from the vampire. The species was strong and this one was old, it had survived for centuries too. It was not to be taken lightly. If it attacked, Aka Maga would simply leave its host. But the vampire could choose to take what belonged to Aka Maga and Aka Maga alone, and it was not about to lose the boy again.

Everything had a weakness. It had discovered that centuries ago. So it had followed the vampire as he had made his way back to his lair, when the first rays of sun had lightened the sky.

In its disguise, it had easily flitted from branch to branch as he had passed through the copse of trees adjoining the field, which ran down to the dry stone wall at the back of the house. The land here still belonged to The Manor, but Carver leased it to the local farmer. The field lay on an incline and the tree-studded rise led to a deeper pocket of silver birches. It was in here, with a full view of the back of the house, that the vampire crept.

The stone crypt was once used by the original family who had built the house, and the dusty bones of its ancestors lay entombed in its inner walls. Weather and neglect had dressed the once-white stone with a film of green-grey algae and tiny dents, like the pock marks of a natural plague.

It was into this cold and unloved place the vampire went, greeted by two others. Aka Maga watched from the leafy branches of a slender birch. He saw the need of the vampire’s children as his arm slid around them both. Aka Maga saw the tiny fangs nipping at his flesh. It could hear the desperate, hungry mewling from one. He would feed them, and they would sleep the sleep of the undead.

But Aka Maga did not need to sleep when the sun rose high in the sky, and that would be his advantage.

Now, he led Beth along the same path that the vampire had followed that morning. She was delighted to be outside, running across the summer grass, occasionally stopping to stoop and stare at a meadow flower. She didn’t seem to mind that the soles of her feet were dirty, or the fact that the wind forced the flimsy material of her dress against her pale skin, outlining her thin frame.

The vampire was already prowling around the outskirts of the house. It could feel his presence. Aka Maga hesitated. The blood drinker would be free to do whatever he wished, but its plan was not yet fully in action. Beth stopped and looked back at the house as though she read its thoughts. Her lower lip trembled.

It could not risk leaving the vampire alone.

Beth was happy with what it whispered against her ear. She loved games, just as much as she loved to be outside. Clapping her hands with joy, she raced towards the treeline, her thin shawl falling from her shoulders to the ground. The silver birches dazzled in the early evening light, welcoming her into their fold, and fate.

Chapter Forty-Five

Ollie Taverner was struggling.

He thrived on routine and, since coming to The Manor, he had slipped into one that nurtured him in a place deep inside. The endless foster families and social institutions had left him feeling like life was one endless swirl of doubt. Going into fits of rage was his sister’s domain, and he remembered cowering in a corner when she had had one spectacular episode just before Christmas—when the foster family who cared for them decided they weren’t ‘a fit’. He didn’t ever want to be that out of control, so he learned to hide his emotions. No one could react unfavourably if he was calm and sensible. But there was still something missing, a great void where his life wasn’t connecting, and he had found that connection here.

But since yesterday, everything he thought was solid and true had changed.

Both he and Olivia had been lied to so many times in their lives they assumed it was normal. Carver had drilled it into them that the one thing he couldn’t abide was a liar. If they made a mistake in their research, own up to it. If an upset was caused and they were the perpetrator, apologise. No secrets, no grudges. Four little words, which had opened Ollie’s mind in such a way, he had felt reborn.

He watched as Gabe picked up his iPad and saw the white mask of confused fear on his face. There was nothing out there and nothing in this room but Gabe’s imagination, and that could be a terrible thing.

Carver’s decision to keep the knowledge about the existence of the box away from Gabe grated away in Ollie’s mind like dry skin against silk. It battled with his respect and admiration for the curator.

He tried to keep Olivia from his mind, but the thought kept picking away that she might have been lying too, and if she had the box, she was in danger.

‘Ollie?’ Gabe’s concerned glance told him his face wasn’t hiding much.

He thought back to when he was fifteen and had first come here, how grown up he had felt—but really, he had known nothing.

He slipped his arm around the boy’s shoulders, and then ruffled his hair. Gabe ducked, laughed, and tagged his arm, a game from those years before. Then they stood and looked at each other, the smile fading from Gabe’s face.

‘Let’s go in the kitchen and see if there’s any pizza lurking in the freezer.’ He wasn’t hungry, but he needed to talk to Gabe alone.

Carver and Noah were deep in conversation. Their voices, sometimes heated, drifted down the hallway.

Gabe followed Ollie and slipped onto one of the high stools by the breakfast bar. He tucked his foot into the footrest and pulled himself in, an unconscious move Ollie had always found very endearing. Ollie rummaged around at the back of the freezer, past all the wholesome casseroles and crumbles meant for emergencies and found an ice-covered box with battered edges. Ella would never agree to have junk food in the house, but she looked past the odd pizza box as something necessary, like a rite of passage for all teenagers.

The wind howled against the windows, bringing lashings of heavy rain and Gabriel looked up. Ollie reached across for the cord on the blind.

‘No, leave it up. I’d rather see than be blind to what’s out there.’ It was such a resigned and poignant sentence. As though he had already accepted his fate.

‘Gabe, when you said you wanted to see inside the vault, what did you expect to find there?’ He brushed the ice on the pizza into the sink but kept his eyes on Gabe’s face. Was he fishing for reasons? Or did he want Gabe to mention he did know about the box?

Gabe hesitated, his mouth twisting into a knot. ‘To be honest, I don’t know why I wanted to go in there. Because it’s banned?’ He laughed, but it was a cold, hard sound.

Ollie grabbed hold of the front of the Belfast sink, the pizza discarded on the counter. He wheeled around and strode across to where Gabe sat, planting his palms face down right in front of him. ‘Fuck it, Gabe!’ His voice was a measured hiss of frustration. ‘There are too many secrets. We’re all running around like we’re going to get burnt if we fess up, and that’s exactly what IT wants.’ He flung his hand dramatically towards the window.

Gabe’s face lost every ounce of colour and his eyes widened, then narrowed as he dropped them to his lap. Ollie held his breath. Gabe could so easily clam up after his outburst. He probably thought Ollie was losing it altogether.

‘I thought I could fix everything.’ The boy’s voice was hardly more than a whisper. ‘I thought I could solve what had happened to my family if the answer lay behind the vault door. I mean, what the hell was I thinking?’ He raised his hands and Ollie grabbed hold of them and held tight. ‘If all the experts in this house couldn’t find an answer, why should I be able to? What if I started all of this, Ollie? What if what happened to Ella is my fault? What if....’ The boy’s lower lip trembled as he choked out the name of his mother.

Ollie pulled him close as racks of painful guilt shook Gabe’s body. He held on as the boy he thought of as a brother cried.

The older men were still cloistered in the parlour. Ella was lying in a hospital bed. And Beth and Olivia were God knows where. But right now, Gabe’s warmth was pressed tight against his chest...

Ollie froze in place as the thought hung over him like a water droplet, fat and moist and ready to burst.

Gabe buried his head further against Ollie’s shoulder. He could smell the heat rising from Gabe’s skin. Ollie shook his head from side to side as if he could dislodge the seed of desire that had suddenly germinated in his mind. Gabe looked up, his cheeks stained with tears, and Ollie had to fight the need to wipe them away with his fingers.

‘We need to get back to the parlour, before the search party comes in.’ He hoped his voice didn’t sound as shaky as it did in his own head.

Gabe glanced at him with a strange look in his eyes as he wiped his face on his arm. ‘What did you mean about secrets?’ A flush of embarrassment flared on Gabe’s cheeks.

‘Later, okay? When we’re alone again.’ But Ollie knew that, right now, he couldn’t trust himself enough to do that.

Chapter Forty-Six

It was full dark but the sky was alive with electric light. Nature’s fireworks against a backdrop of brilliant indigo, bruised and beaten. The wind tore through the tops of the silver birches, bending them to its will, lashing the hard rain against any surface it could find, angry and vicious and screaming its rage.

Beth stood shivering in a small glade. Her dress clung to the contours of her body and her feet were numb with cold. She was confused. Secret had said they were playing a game of hide and seek. But she had hid and counted and hid and counted again, all the while aware in some inner place that there was something not quite right. She crossed her arms across her chest and hugged her elbows. Across the fields stood The Manor, in darkness apart from a couple of pinpricks of warm light at ground level. How had she got here?

Weariness had crept into her bones; all she wanted to do was find a spot to curl up and sleep. Then Ella would come with her supper, on the rose-patterned white tray.

Another rumble rolled through the sky and Beth put her hands over her ears, stumbling in the undergrowth, crying out as the brambles tore at her exposed skin. She ran blindly, with no direction or purpose. In the tree line, a tawny owl hooted. She raised her head at its call, just in time to see it silently glide through the trees in front of her. Did it know her bird? Would it lead her to Secret?

Beth ran deeper into the glade as it sloped slightly uphill. A fallen log twisted across her path and she leapt over it, catching her ankle on a nub of rotten branch. She fell heavily, winding herself. The ground was carpeted in old pine needles. The smell was...Christmas. It would be so easy to simply close her eyes here.

The owl hooted again and Beth raised her head. A little way ahead, the trees thinned, opening onto clear ground. In the middle of this ground she could see an old stone building.

It was a small house.

***

The two young vampires heard her approaching, but that sense had not been their keenest. Her scent travelled before her, carried along by the buffeting wind and rain. They paced the confines of the crypt like lions in a cage as temptation came ever nearer. Their mentor had forbidden them to leave these four, grave-cold walls tonight. The memory of the fate of one of their brothers—when they were three—haunted them still.

One huddled in the far corner, amidst the dried leaves and dust, his arms wrapped around his knees, dirty blond hair matted with twigs and other debris. He rocked himself slowly, humming a tuneless song.

The other stood at the glassless window, leaning against the stone pillar, at one with the fabric of the building. Occasionally, he tasted the air with his tongue, a rapid reptilian movement too quick for a human eye. This was Moth, so called for his non-descript, ashy hair and eyes—one, steel grey and one, the colour of a muddy puddle. Those eyes swept the forest, pin-pointing anything warm blooded with needle-sharp precision. Trails of saliva ran from the corners of his lips.

‘Stop it.’ He threw the words backwards. ‘She’ll hear you.’

The humming stopped and two bright, green-blue eyes appeared in the gloom. ‘I was humming. Human ears can’t hear that. Not with a storm.’

Moth raised his forefinger to his mouth as his brother appeared, silently, at his side.

The woman climbed to her feet, her eyes fixed right on them, or so it seemed, but they knew they were invisible. Her state of dress explained the strength of her scent. She might as well have been naked.

‘She must be from the house.’ Moth’s whisper was barely audible. His brother shuffled from foot to foot, a little groan of despair in his throat. If she was from the house, she was even more off-limits.

Her heartbeat fluttered, and with each flutter the blood in her veins rushed through her body. The vibration drummed into their ears, their senses attuned to each beat.

Moth felt his brother’s muscles tense. ‘Teal, no!’ He threw out his arm to block the leap he could nearly feel.

The woman pulled the soaking tangle of material from between her thighs as she paddled through the sea of mud in front of the crypt. ‘Hello...hello.’ Her voice was whipped away by the wind.

Moth’s hunger clawed at his throat. She could be theirs in the time it took for her eyes to widen in shock, before her throat was open, her scream torn from her. They could run, giddy with new blood and the thrill of the kill. They could make a new den for themselves somewhere far away. But he knew this was an idle wish; their mentor would find them and he would kill them. He would kill Teal first and make Moth watch—it wouldn’t be quick. Flashes of the night Sasha died swam before his eyes. Teal may have forgotten that lesson in this heated moment, but Moth was not prepared to lose another brother.

The woman crept up the stone steps leading to the slightly open heavy door.

If Teal pounced, Moth wasn’t sure he could resist any spatter of blood. Just as the woman raised her fist to the door, Moth caught Teal in the unbalanced moment of pounce, sending them both sprawling to the floor. Moth tore at the flesh of his arm with small fangs, ripping rather than slicing. He had never done this before and didn’t even know if he could. In a split second, Teal’s lips were sealed around the wound and the heady sense of being drawn into his brother’s body pulled at Moth’s veins.

A tentative knock sounded at the door, followed by another. Slowly, the door creaked open. Moth closed his eyes and pulled Teal closer.

Chapter Forty-Seven

For the first time in his adult life, Edward Carver felt out of his depth.

He had always prided himself on managing to walk the fine line between the safety of those under his roof and his ground-breaking research. He could have been a much richer man by taking up all the offers of lectures and book tours, but he preferred the thrill of delving into unexplained occurrences much more. And besides, he didn’t need any more money. He was the only son of parents who had inherited a sizeable fortune from a Scottish uncle, who had stumbled into the sugar-manufacturing business right at the point when the twentieth century had developed a sweet tooth.

Carver was what his great uncle called a ‘canny lad’. To his parents’ dismay, he had no desire to follow in his uncle’s footsteps, and when they died, both within a year of each other, he dumped a huge chunk of money down on a dilapidated old manor house in the middle of nowhere. He wanted space to pursue an interest that had become an obsession, but the feel of the house had also won him over as soon as he had ducked under the cobwebs by the weather-beaten front door.

Still, the last twenty-four hours made him question the decisions he had made fifteen years ago. There was no doubt in his mind the box was connected to all the mayhem that had happened. He had buried it in the vault because it was the one case he had never been able to fully solve. As he sat in the parlour with Noah at his side, he wondered if pride had decided to make him pay.

Neither of them could settle. Carver could tell from Noah’s straight back and drumming fingers that he was uneasy. The storm did nothing to help that, with the wind so loud it threatened to break every pane of glass in the house.

Noah wasn’t happy about the decision not to look for Beth.

‘Look, I’ll go by myself. You’ve got a decent flashlight and waterproofs—and I managed to deter whatever it was when Gabe was a baby. I have that same psalm book in my jacket pocket.’

Carver saw a muscle twitch in the priest’s jaw and knew the determination in that gesture. ‘Noah, that’s what it wants! To get us all singularly and somehow scope out our weaknesses. You told me so yourself. And ultimately, it wants Gabriel.’ Carver tried to play on Noah’s love for the boy.

‘What about Beth? Do we just abandon her?’ Noah’s voice rose. He stood and paced to the window. ‘This damn storm. Will it ever stop?’ The priest laid an open palm against the glass.

‘If you could produce a miracle, it would come in handy.’ Carver regretted his choice of phrase as soon as it had left his lips.

‘Don’t make light of the situation, Edward. Faith might be the one thing that helps, if we’re lucky.’

Carver didn’t like the tone in Noah’s voice. It was resigned, as though speaking the words might make it be so. If Noah was losing his resolve, they could all be damned.

He glanced up as Ollie and Gabe appeared in the doorway. Both looked uncomfortable and Gabe had a slight flush of high colour to his cheeks.

‘Is everything okay?’

‘We just needed space,’ said Gabe as Ollie looked down at the floor. ‘And Ollie put pizza on. So I hope you’re both ready to fur up a few arteries.’ It was a typical Gabe comment, usually said with a ‘butter wouldn’t melt in my mouth’’ expression. This time it sounded as flat as the atmosphere in the room.

Noah sighed as he stepped back from the bay window. ‘I’ll go throw together a salad. I don’t care if no one eats it. I can’t just sit here.’

Gabe hesitated as though he was going to follow but Carver beckoned him across. Sometimes it was easy to forget he was only fifteen. Even as a child, he had possessed a maturity that defied his age. Carver wondered how on earth he was managing to hold it all together. His mother was missing. The ghost of his dead father had been sighted. The house he had called home had been burnt down by someone he trusted. And there was a palpable sense of danger in the house. It permeated every surface and hung in the air so that even the act of sitting on a chair became an unnatural, uneasy thing.

He waited until the boy flopped down on the rug by his feet, something he hadn’t done since he was small, and allowed to stay up and listen to grown up conversation as long as he didn’t interrupt...a hard lump lodged itself inside his throat.

Ollie was trying to get a signal on his phone, which was a waste of time considering what raged outside, but like Noah, doing anything was better than doing nothing.

‘Gabriel, have you seen anything strange since this morning?’ Carver tried to keep his voice steady, but behind the boy’s head, he was gripping the edge of the seat cushion. Part of him wanted to shake Gabe and make him tell. Heat rose in his veins as his hand fell to Gabe’s shoulder. The boy inclined his head and his hair fell between Carver’s fingers.

For a few seconds, no one spoke. In that moment, Carver knew something had happened when Ollie and Gabe had been in the White Room.

‘Everything’s been strange.’ The reply was guarded, and not really an answer to his question.

His fingers tightened along the curve of Gabe’s collarbone and the boy raised his head in surprise. Carver wondered how easy it would be to shatter that bone with only the strength of his fingers....how it would feel to wrench the splinter of that bone through that young skin...

Gabe shuffled in discomfort. ‘Hey, that’s sore. I must be a bit bruised from this morning.’

Carver’s vision narrowed until all that was in focus was the boy’s face. There was a questioning look in those eyes that made his stomach churn. How dare he sit there and lie? Wasn’t he the cause of all this upset?

A loud drumming resounded inside his head, blocking out even the noise of the storm and a smell.... exotic incense and a pungent burning...something horrible...

He wrenched his hand away from Gabriel’s shoulder. It was leaden and his fingers were numb.

Ollie was moving towards them, something he felt on an instinctive level, rather than saw. The heat from Gabriel’s skin pulled away and he wanted to scream. He sat back in his chair, raising his face to the ceiling and screwing his eyes shut. Acrid bile filled his mouth but he swallowed it. The bitter pill.

He had thought they would all be safe if they just stayed together. But now it was using them against each other to tear them apart. It was winning.

Chapter Forty-Eight

Noah Isaacs had not gone to make a salad.

And it was a testament to how distressed Carver was that the curator hadn’t seen through the lie as soon as he had spoken it. Noah didn’t even like salad; it was the subject of many of the students’ jokes that he could hide unfinished greenery on his plate enough to not ruffle Ella’s feathers.

Three pendant lights hung over the kitchen central island, casting pools of golden light onto the surface below—the low hum of the electric oven the only sound. He stopped and ran a finger along a small pool of melted ice, listening to make sure no one had followed him. Gabe looked as if he might.

Noah hadn’t lied when he said he had to do something, though the decision didn’t bring him any joy. His conscience wouldn’t let him rest until he had at least looked for Beth. It might be a fruitless labour in this storm, but at least he would know he had tried.

A small window of opportunity beckoned. If he dallied, the boys would be through to check on the pizza, though he doubted anyone would be able to stomach it.

The waterproofs and other outdoor clothing lived in the boot room, and a supply of torches stood in the cupboard under the sink. This was a rural place with no streetlights and the dark came earlier than in the town. Noah tried to pluck his courage from any small space he could. Wasn’t this where the heroic minister went out into the storm and single-handedly rescued the hapless victim? But in this case, he could very well be the victim. Carver was right in his assumption that whatever evil was out there was trying to pick them off singularly. He knew that deep down, so it made even thinking about going out into the night about as appealing as kneeling on gravel for a penance.

He grabbed a dark green parka and shrugged himself into it. It seemed a ridiculous piece of clothing for a late summer evening. He pulled on Carver’s weatherproof boots and knelt to tie them, all of the time wishing some kind of divine light would tell him that this was the right thing to do. He wet his lips with his tongue—his mouth seemed to have lost all moisture.

The door creaked slightly as he pulled down the handle and he paused, listening for footsteps. He had to fight with the wind as it opened, the sheer force of the blast wanting to tear it from his hand and send it slamming against the wall. Sheets of rain caught him full in the face as he moved away from the shelter of the porch overhang. He turned his back and was immediately buffeted by the gusts. With slippery fingers, he switched on the flashlight and pointed it across the lawn. It arced through the darkness, highlighting the heavy rain as it swirled in the storm’s grasp.

He called her name only for it to be torn from his lips. Overhead, a great peal of thunder rolled through the sky. He understood how in the past, people thought it was God’s displeasure.

If Carver came looking for him, he wouldn’t even hear the curator’s shout, such was the ferocity of the weather. That was one thing he didn’t have to worry about. But he had told his friend another untruth; the psalm book he had claimed was in his jacket was at home on a table in the hallway. When had it become so easy to lie?

Noah had thought about trying to find a small bible or something holy to clasp, although there was a gnawing fear in his gut that this time, it wouldn’t matter. He battled on, the wind tearing his breath away. He had to stop and inhale against his arm before continuing. The torch pinpointed dark bushes and swathes of green, battered flowers as they lay on the ground, and tunnels of complete blackness. He scoured the perimeter of the garden, checking the outhouse, where the gardening tools glinted in the torch light, and the workshops at the back of the garages, all in the vain hope Beth had gone outside and simply lost her bearings. But a constant voice in his head told him she must have climbed out of the window. His heart was in his mouth as he searched the ground underneath the back windows and all of the little alcoves where the climbing roses rambled behind wooden seats.

Time began to have no meaning. He couldn’t have said if he had been out here for ten minutes or a few hours. But the thing he had feared didn’t come and that spurred him on. A strange sense of elation crept up like the moment you realise you can swim without holding onto the side of the pool. Was it possible all of this was in their heads?

His steps led to the furthest point of the garden, where the fountain stood on its plinth of weathered stone. Carver had disconnected the fountain when Gabe was a toddler and had the whole piece covered in soil and bedding plants. Somehow, it had never been returned to its former glory. Noah rested against the rim to catch his breath and dipped the torch beam down the slight incline to the fence, which separated the grounds and the field. The black void beyond seemed never-ending. Rain ran down the inside of his boots and the neck of his parka, the moisture mixing with his sweat. A trickle ran down his spine and he shrugged against the feeling sending his beam of light away to the left.

Out of the corner of his eye, he thought he saw something. Swinging the torch back, a flicker of pale material whipped against the fencepost. Noah set off at a run, sliding down the embankment as the sodden ground gave way under his feet. Half stumbling and half upright, he followed the line of the fence, his heart tripping against the inside of his chest. If Beth had fallen here and had been out all of this time...he pushed the thought away, snatching at his hood as the wind found a gap and demanded an entrance.

The thin wisp of material twisted madly in the gale and he had to grab for it twice. Even soaked through, he recognised it as part of the shawl Beth had been wearing that morning.

He should go and get the others to come and search. Beth had been here. Tearing the remnants from the splinter of wood it had snagged on, he turned back to the house, sharpening his focus on the soft glow of the few lights that interrupted the darkness. Every bone in his body screamed for attention. So much for thinking that he was fairly fit.

The bird came out of nowhere, its front legs extended, talons gleaming as the torch caught the shape. There was something in its claws; Noah’s vision registered this right before his feet went from underneath him in the gulley by the fence. The bird latched onto his head, talons slicing into the soft wet flesh of his cheeks. An image of Gabe at the bottom of the steps flooded into his mind and he cried out, but the sound was suffocated against the sour-smelling feathers. He tried to tear it away, dropping his flashlight. It rolled down into the ditch, sending a pitiful shaft of light into the field. Why couldn’t he beat the bird off? His fingers flailed against the seething mass of dark feathers. It opened its beak and flung back its head, letting out a cry of triumph. This wasn’t the caw of any corvid, but the manic skittering of a thousand tiny feet.

Noah tried to scream. He tried to pray. But all of his faith was carried away by that poisonous sound. The bird plucked the object from its claws, spinning it in its beak, and plunging it against Noah’s forehead. A bolt of pain shot through him as his skin seared under blazing heat. His nerve receptors fired in unison as the stench of his own burning skin hit his nostrils.

The bird settled itself against his face and mouth, stifling any catch of breath. It raised the object high then dropped it on the ground. Noah shifted his head, eyes fluttering as a high-pitched buzzing filled his ears.

In the dim light of the torch beam, he could just make out that the object on the ground was a crucifix.

Chapter Forty-Nine

Elation flowed through Aka Maga.

It flew with the storm, allowing itself to be buffeted and swept before this force of nature, revelling in the power as only it could. Only the complete saturation of its host’s feathers caused it to stop, diving into the leaf-filled branches of the tallest tree in the garden. From there, it shook itself and stood sentinel over the chaos it had begun. The bird cowered, its fragile bones battered. Aka Maga relented. It could not risk losing this vessel, not yet.

Far below, the priest crawled up the gulley, hampered by sodden mud and the knowledge that his faith had been used against him. It had been too easy to fly to the vicarage and slip into the quiet house. Too easy to find the crucifix the priest kept displayed on a shelf in a dusty alcove. This one thing had belonged to his father, a chaplain, who for forty years had served his local parish, wearing that very cross daily. But Benjamin Isaacs had lost his faith—not due to any act of God or family tragedy, but because God hadn’t granted him anything but a bad case of arthritis and Benjamin expected more. He had gone the way of many wearing the cloth and turned to drink. The cross lay discarded in a drawer until Benjamin’s death, when Noah brought it out of the dark, fingering its ornate carved surface. He couldn’t throw it away, but it became a constant reminder of how easy it would be to simply give in and spend your life staring into the bottom of a glass.

Aka Maga thought it perfectly fitting that it had used this same crucifix to brand the man who had stolen away its prize. It had carried the crucifix back through the night, letting it soak up the poison it had borne for so long. An unloved, holy relic can easily be imbibed by any force.

Inside The Manor, Ollie and Carver sat together—but their thoughts were deep inside their own world. The student, who had been the easiest to corrupt, sat on the high-backed wooden chair by the window, staring out at the storm. His eyes were glazed, his fingers picking a hangnail and pulling the skin down to the quick. Aka Maga had chosen Ollie’s fear well. He had never felt anything more than platonic love for Gabriel, but it had found the desire as soon as it had slipped unobtrusively inside Ollie’s head. It knew it could not claim him, for he was an adult man, but a little mental tweaking? It had been a thrill to witness the scene in the kitchen as those first thoughts entered the student’s head.

The girl had sealed her own fate by storming out of the house that morning. Aka Maga bore a grudging respect for the fiery side of her nature. It found the fact the box had been part of her hasty exit extremely fitting. How very little they all knew about its power now it had left the prison behind. Aka Maga had hoped she would meet an oncoming car as she sped around the narrow lanes, but it seemed fate walked by her side in that respect.

Her meeting with the meddling spirit of Stu Davenport was the one irritating part of its day. At the time, it had been busy with Beth. And even Aka Maga, all seeing, all hearing, could not be in two places at one time. It had had no hand in the accident, apart from its swoop down across the windscreen, which it had done out of spite for her conversation with the dead man. The car and the ditch were well on the way to meeting at that point, but it wanted her to see and to take that image down to her grave.

In the drawing room, the curator sat in the same chair where he had clawed at Gabriel’s shoulder. Carver’s face was bone white and drawn. He had aged a decade in a day. He lowered his head into his hands as the grandfather clock chimed eleven times. Edward Carver would rather have eaten shards of glass than hurt Gabriel. Keeping him safe had been at the forefront of all of Carver’s decisions for fifteen years.

The professional side of Carver’s brain knew his thoughts had been compromised, just as he had told Noah, but pushing those thoughts to the back of his mind proved to be as hard as trying to hold water in your hand. The sense and logic all drained away into the bowl leaving only a wet smear of hopelessness.

But oh, vexing the vampire had been its greatest triumph of the night. Aka Maga knew that as an adversary, the blood drinker was a worthy opponent; they each had their unique talents. So tempting the vampire’s children, especially with someone from this household and therefore off-limits, was a touch of sheer genius.

The bird fluffed up its feathers, its small brain incapable of understanding what lurked in its veins. Such a dark tableau of infinite possibilities and enjoyment. And it hadn’t even started on the boy yet. It preened a wet wing feather and imagined the moment when Gabriel Davenport became its vessel of destruction.

Chapter Fifty

Gabe slipped out of the parlour fully expecting someone to pull him back in again.

Carver had said being alone was dangerous, but right now being with people made him feel edgy and confused. The episode with Ollie in the kitchen played on his mind even though he tried to shut it out. If they had stood there a moment longer, Ollie would have tried to kiss him, which had to be up there in the top three of weird happenings today. Was that Ollie’s mind being played with, or some long-held desire that had chosen that moment to pop up?

Gabe had so much swirling around in his head, it took him a few moments to register that Noah wasn’t in the kitchen. He looked round, expecting the priest to appear from the depths of the pantry or the boot annex, but the room was silent apart from the hum of the oven. Inside, the pizza was slowly baking itself into a burnt offering. Gabe shut off the oven and left it to finish its cremation.

‘Noah?’ For a moment, he wondered if he had gone down into the jam cellar again. Something that could only have been euphoria blanketed the prickling of fear. The door was closed.

Gabe did a sweep of the room and found the cupboard door under the sink slightly ajar. His first glance told him there was a flashlight missing, the biggest one, which Carver used when the power went out. A cold realisation hit him. The only reason someone would need a torch like that was if they were out on a night like this. Noah had gone looking for Beth, despite Carver’s protests. It was a stupid—and probably fruitless—task, but Gabe felt a rush of love for the man who had already saved his life once. The emotion came to a sudden halt, overridden by the cold trickle of dread.

He hovered by the door, his own reflection staring back at him in the glass panel. Why was he so important? He was little more than a kid with a dysfunctional family, pretty normal in this day and age.

Up to an hour ago, he would have thought longer about his next decision. But he couldn’t shake the feeling that something toxic had seeped into the house, and that maybe being inside wasn’t the safe haven people imagined. He raised his hand and rubbed the side of his neck, still able to feel the hard pressure of Carver’s fingers.

Rain pelted against the window in an angry lash, and the trunks of the old trees groaned in the onslaught. Stupid to go out, stupid to stay here. The scales were balanced; nothing was in his favour. A hard lump formed in his throat, made from exhaustion, frustration, and a huge sense of the unfairness of life. He hadn’t done anything to warrant being hunted, and even if some miracle occurred and they all got through this night, the prospect of it all happening again one day was very real. He would have to live his life looking over his shoulder or spend it cloistered away somewhere, too scared to glance into the shadows.

This was a strange place to be contemplating how useless things were. The riff raff of country living strewn around, muddy boots piled in a heap, watched over by a couple of shooting sticks. Weatherproof coats huddled together like sheep on the coat rail, a stack of newspapers waiting for someone to take them out to the garage and a recycling bin. An enamel bucket with a screwed-up cloth over the handle.

Gabe clenched his teeth and curled his fingers into his palms. He wanted to scream but didn’t want the attention that would cause.

Furious tears welled in his eyes and he bit down on his bottom lip. A voice in his head whispered, go outside, look for Noah.

Gabe wrenched open the door. The rain pelted against his face, making his skin sting and filling his eyes. His breath was whipped away as he shut the door, his t-shirt instantly soaked through. He lifted his face to the sky as a bolt of lightning crossed the darkness in a jagged line, illuminating the tops of the trees. But this was better than being inside. This was feeling. This was existing.

He half ran, carried along by gusts of wind tearing around the side of the house, looking for any pinprick of light that might be Noah. Holding his arms out to the side, he whirled on the steps leading to the lawn, a strangled laugh bursting from his throat.

‘Come and get me you fucker!’ The wind took his words and smashed them into fragments but Gabe didn’t care. He was high on the feeling that he was controlling his own destiny for once. Turning his back to the wind, he let it pummel him across the sodden grass, his feet slipping until he fell onto his knees, his hands splayed out, fingers digging into the dirt. A rack of sobs overcame him. He wondered how long it would take to die.

The wind halted for an instant and he looked up, aware in some instinctive way that he wasn’t alone. He wanted to be brave. He wanted to look whatever it was in the eye.

The darkness before him became solid. Gabe slowly lifted his face, unable to stop his jaw from trembling. His legs were too weak to try to stand. So this was it. On his knees. But he wouldn’t beg, he wouldn’t—

A pale hand reached out and lifted his chin with one long, cold finger—the stranger he had seen from the window.

Gabe flinched, but made himself look up into the face above. A black hood billowed in the wind and strands of long dark hair whipped across his cheekbones. Dark eyes stared out from skin so pale it looked like snow. A slightly slanted brow arched in his direction.

‘Young master. Don’t ask for death. It will come your way in some form eventually.’

A thumb joined the finger, clasping his chin in a vice-like grip. Gabe steeled himself, sure that whatever happened, it was going to be incredibly painful and drawn out.

‘So you’re the one. Not quite what I expected.’ And with that, he swept open his cloak and pulled Gabe into its dank-smelling folds.

Chapter Fifty-One

The vampire had watched as Aka Maga worked its savage revenge on Noah.

He had skirted around the edges of the house, an unseen dark shape moving as one with the storm. At any point, the vampire could have slipped inside and sheltered but he knew the bird carried the demon within it and was curious to see how the evening would unfold. He had no ties to the humans who lived within the four walls but he was intrigued, a state of mind he couldn’t quite decide was a blessing or a curse.

But the demon posed a problem, and one he hadn’t encountered for many decades. Its sheer brash arrogance, tempered with its obvious power, was not something to walk away from. These things had a habit of resurfacing at the most inopportune times. And he had fledglings near.

Discovering the boy offering himself out on the lawn had been a surprise. It might have been foolishness, but he couldn’t deny the sense of honour and self-sacrifice. He didn’t think mortals did that anymore. It had gone the way of doffing caps—an unnecessary gesture.

Yet he couldn’t stand by and let the possessed bird do its unspeakable things, not yet. The mortals knew about the spirit, their knowledge could help him to destroy it, so they needed to be spared.

The boy trembled within the folds of his cloak as he moved swiftly, climbing the creeper that clung to the walls, his guest pressed tight against his side. He pushed the window open and heaved the boy unceremoniously onto his bedroom floor. Following quickly, he slammed the window shut and pulled back the dark hood covering his face.

The boy scrabbled back, crab-like, his face a pale mask of terror, only stopping when his back jammed against the opposite wall. The vampire sighed, realising his appearance must be quite shocking. He was tall, well over six feet with long limbs and fingers. Eyes that were so dark they seemed black sat below slightly slanted eyebrows, and full lips balanced his face. His hair hung well past his shoulders, straight and matt black with dust.

‘Why don’t we start by introducing ourselves, like civilised creatures?’ He dropped onto one knee, level with the boy’s ashen face. ‘Ah, you still think I have come to kill you?’ The boy swallowed, his lips parting slightly. ‘I am not he. What you fear is in the shape of a bird.’ He paused. ‘But I see you know this already.’

The boy’s brow furrowed and the vampire studied the marks on his face.

‘I am not being fair, my apologies. I read your mind, which is rather impolite considering you’ve yet to tell me your name.’

Spittle formed on the boy’s lips before he managed to speak. ‘If you can read minds, you could simply take my name.’

The vampire smiled but it didn’t quite reach his eyes. ‘Touché, my young friend. I could indeed take anything I wanted from your mind. In fact, I could strip it bare and leave you with absolutely no memory of anything but the present.’ He placed his hands together, fingers steepled.

‘What....are you?’ The boy stared at him with wide eyes.

The vampire inclined his head and raised an eyebrow.

‘My name is Gabriel, Gabriel Davenport.’

The vampire bowed slightly, sweeping his hand in front of him. ‘Forgive the theatricals. Old habits die hard. Now, as you have been so forthcoming, I will introduce myself....are you going to spend the entire time pressed up against that wall? It can’t be comfortable.’ The boy’s shoulders dropped a little and he pulled his knees into his chest. The vampire laughed softly. ‘You remind me of someone, but that is not important now.’ He ran a finger along the wooden rail at the base of the bed, and then leant against it.

The boy was visibly staring now, but he ignored the scrutiny.

‘My name is Clove, although that was not my given name. As a child, I worked upon the great ships, bringing spices from the Far East—hence my naming.’ He watched as the boy’s jaw slackened. He could almost see the cogs whirring in his mind. ‘I could tell you a great deal more and maybe I shall, but what you must know is this: I am a vampire.’

Gabriel’s intake of breath caught in his throat, a single, shuddering sound.

‘Come now, you live in this place of supernatural discoveries. Surely ones such as I are documented somewhere as more than simply over-imaginative fiction?’ He glanced to the window, aware of some tremor in the air, then continued. ‘But I am what I am and I make no apology for it. I did not come here to befriend you or to save you, let me be clear on that. But I believe we can help each other. Is this a suitable proposition?’

The boy had shrunk back again, his chin nearly on his knees as he clutched them to his chest.

Clove clicked his tongue against the roof of his mouth. ‘I need an answer, Gabriel. In fact, come here and give me one.’ He pointed one slender finger to the spot in front of him. His acute senses picked out the quickening of the boy’s heart and the instant rush of blood as adrenaline kicked in.

This was a dangerous moment. All it would take would be a momentary lapse on his part, a giving in to the instinct to feed, and nothing could save Gabriel, not even the demon hunter outside. This was a test for both of them. He fixed his eyes on the boy and waited, his face expressionless.

The storm still raged outside but it had become a distant background noise. The boy’s breathing was ragged and his limbs trembled as he forced himself into first a kneeling position, then rose shakily to his feet. He wondered what his reaction would be if Gabriel declined his offer. His dark eyes narrowed at the thought.

Gabriel’s feet moved slowly, as if they were glued to the floor. But inch by inch, and by some huge force of will, he was coming closer. After what seemed like hours, Clove looked down into the upturned face. The graze was a dark, angry shadow along Gabriel’s cheekbone. He raised his hand and touched the mark, feeling the heat throbbing through his fingertips.

Gabriel’s breath came fast and warm against his wrist. ‘Yes.’

Clove took the pale face in his hands and bent to kiss the top of Gabriel’s head. Trust had to be earned, but in this case, Gabriel didn’t have much choice. It was only a single word, but with that, this game of bait and dare had changed forever.

Underneath this truce, a flicker of disturbance grew. Like a radio wave, it spiked through the maelstrom of the storm.

Out there, something walked across the web of his radar.

But inside, this house was no safe haven. Clove made his decision.

Chapter Fifty-Two

Carver dragged himself out of the funk he had fallen into. The raging of the storm just about summed up his mood but he couldn’t let despair take over. Noah was taking a ridiculously long time to make salad. And where was Gabe? He squeezed Ollie’s shoulder as he went past and received a wan smile in return.

The smell of burnt pizza greeted him. Nothing green lurked on the counter top. He frowned and a flutter of unease uncurled its wings.

‘Damn you, Noah, where are you?’ His voice echoed as if he had entered a room devoid of all furniture. ‘Gabe?’ The only sound was a dripping tap in the boot room.

He wondered if they were together. He hoped they were together. If they weren’t...he ran his tongue over his teeth. He counted the bale of coats and rifled amongst them, hoping to find his own green storm jacket underneath. But it had gone. He knew it had gone before he had even counted. Surely Noah wouldn’t have taken Gabe outside, not in this weather, not with what they all knew was there?

Whirling around so quickly that he nearly fell, he sprinted for the hallway and took the steps two at a time. Ollie called out as he sped past but he didn’t even take the time to answer. His focus was purely on the closed door to Gabriel’s room.

‘Gabe! Open the door!’

Without giving anyone inside chance to answer, he barged into the room, shouldering the door out of the way. Ollie pounded up behind him. The window was wide open. The pull cord of the blind whipped from side to side, hitting the glass with a sharp rattle.

But the room was empty.

Carver’s heart sank; it was almost as though he could feel it move physically, which he knew was impossible—but tonight, anything seemed possible.

He leant out of the window, instantly soaking wet, and tried to stare through the lashing rain.

‘Ollie, do a sweep of the rest of the house for me. Gabe and Noah must be somewhere.’ Hope perched on his shoulder as he imagined them in one of the libraries.

Ollie disappeared, heading down the hallway that led to Carver’s room and the guest suites without asking a single question. A small glow of affection for the young student warmed his heart. Ollie was struggling with something, too, and his sister was God knows where. He hadn’t given much thought to the wilful Olivia but if she was out in this? Her driving matched her temper. The beginnings of a tension headache throbbed behind his temple.

Carver slammed down the window and latched it, wiping the rain from his face. Ollie wouldn’t find Noah and Gabe in the house, his gut told him that. Whatever was out there was picking them off like flies. Beth first, then Noah and Gabe. A flare of anger erupted and shot through his veins. He was the one who was supposed to have all the answers. He was supposed to protect them. But cut off by the storm and with the tree blocking the entrance, he was just another duck in the shooting row.

Carver retraced his steps to the boot room, hearing doors opening and closing upstairs. Never had he felt so useless. The wind howled under the small gap at the base of the outside door, forcing its way into any tiny crack, making sure that anyone inside knew that Mother Nature was well and truly in control. He watched the dark shape of the bushes bowing under the onslaught. Out of the corner of his eye, he thought a larger shape loomed. His hand went to one of the shooting sticks propped against the wall. The shape bobbed and struggled against the wind, occasionally being swept backwards.

Carver opened the door, sending it crashing back against the wall, dropping the stick onto the gravel, and running out to greet the bowed form dressed in his green coat. By the height alone, it had to be Noah. He slung his arm around the stooped shoulders and the figure gave way. Carver half supported and half dragged him into the house, the wind rattling all of the glass as it howled through the open door. He paused, glancing back and hoping with all his heart to see another shape struggling, but there remained only blackness. Leaving Noah on the floor, he grappled with the edge of the door, finally managing to slam it shut. His shirt stuck to his back like a second skin.

Ollie’s footsteps resounded in the kitchen. He skidded to a halt and threw himself down beside the man curled up on the floor. Between them, they heaved Noah into a sitting position. He muttered something under his breath, a string of garbled nonsense. Ollie peeled back his hood and gasped.

Carver registered the shock, then looked to Noah’s face himself. ‘Sweet Jesus...what did this?’

Noah’s eyes were bloodshot, the tiny red veins angry and swollen. His lips quivered and he reached out and grabbed Carver’s arm. The grip was like a dead man’s.

But Carver couldn’t keep his eyes on anything but Noah’s forehead. In the middle and running from the bridge of his nose to his hairline, his skin was seared by a mark that looked as if he had been branded by a cattle iron. The edges of the shape were raw and oozing and the skin wept where tiny blisters had burst.

The shape of a crucifix. But it was upside down.

Chapter Fifty-Three

Olivia’s eyes fluttered open and for a moment, she was unsure of whether she was dreaming. Her head felt heavy and a dull ache throbbed in her left hip. A steady drumming sound resounded in her ears. She stretched out one hand and touched her brow. It felt sticky, but she couldn’t see anything on her fingers. Slowly, she came back to consciousness.

A sudden wave of panic engulfed her as the last few moments of her accident replayed in her mind. She struggled to move, only dimly aware that the seat belt still held her firm. Something strange blocked her view of the windscreen. She ran her fingers around and over its surface. A fine powder coated her fingertips. The airbag had—mercifully—deployed as her car had met its resting place. There was a strong, acrid smell like burning dust. The windscreen had shattered but was still in one piece, thousands of crazy paving glass shards smeared in mud. Her car rested on its near side and she was suspended at an odd angle with the driver’s door wedged against her seat base. Without much hope, she pushed the door with one leg and a shoulder but it remained solid against her.

She tried to remember what had happened before she blacked out. It had been a bird swooping down before the spiralling car took her into the ditch. Oh God, yes. She was on her way to The Manor with a message from a man who had been dead for fifteen years...

Shuffling around in her seat, she tried to get as comfortable as she could. Rational thought had better make an appearance soon. The chances of anyone driving past in this weather were pretty much zero, so that finished off the option of being rescued. Her phone? Yeah, she knew where that was and in what state. It was this thought that brought her fully back from the fog she was floating in. She hit the centre of her steering wheel with her fists, blind-angry at herself for making the not-so-smart decisions she’d made today. The horn beeped faintly, more of an apology than a blare of attention.

Okay. The only way out seemed to be staring right at her. The windscreen. Reaching across, she scrabbled in the glove box for anything that might puncture it, her fingers working blind. Lots of paper napkins, a couple of pens, booklets for God knows what. An ache grew in her throat as she tried to reach further, but she was trapped by her belt; if she unfastened it, she would end up in the passenger side. But maybe that would be better? At least she would have her feet against something solid. Olivia hit the red button at her side and tensed as it whipped past her chest. The sensation of falling was brief but it made her cry out, as did the impact with the passenger door. Her shoulder took the brunt of it. A jarring pain shot down her arm, making her fingers tingle.

Her head throbbed with exertion. From somewhere, she thought she heard a voice call her name. She clasped her hands over her head and dug her fingers into her scalp. Her head jerked up as a voice, muffled by rain, came from outside. A sob caught in her throat.

A tapping on the windscreen and then a shout for her attention.

Covering her face, she did as she was told. A sharp rap and the glass collapsed. Through her fingers, she saw fragments littering the dash and the ruddy, concerned face of Tom Jacobson. A few pieces hit her jean-clad thighs. They sparkled like diamonds in his torch beam. His head was covered in a bright yellow sou’wester, the kind fishermen use, and water dripped from its rim.

‘Well, Miss Olivia, looks like you got yourself in a spot of bother. Are you hurt?’ His eyes scanned her face, the deep lines across his brow creasing.

‘I think I’m okay...’ It was all she managed to get out before, to her horror, her eyes filled with tears.

Tom reached down and touched her shoulder then curled his large hand around her wrist. ‘Hang onto my arm and I’ll pull you out. It’s not the weather for man or beast to be out in this.’ His voice was gruff, but kind. Her lower lip trembled. Grasping his arm with both hands, she found something solid to rest her foot on. And with a strength that came from working the land for fifty years, he yanked her through the gap where her windscreen had been onto the soaking and slippery ditch side. His vehicle was parked at the top, its yellow hazard lights flashing, casting little beacons in the night.

Tom pushed her up the slope as though she was a stray sheep who had wandered off, but Olivia didn’t care. Relief had turned her legs to jelly. Rivulets of rain ran down the hill and the wind tunnelled through the trees, swaying their canopies dangerously.

Tom opened the passenger side door, holding it firm against the wind as she climbed in. The inside of the old 4x4 smelled of dusty hay and new tobacco but that didn’t matter either. It was warm and dry. Her hands shook as she clasped them together on her stomach.

‘Tom, can you take me to The Manor? There’s something really important I have to tell Noah.’ Her words came out in a long garble, each one running into the next.

He started the engine and pulled out, glancing at her from underneath his dripping hat.

‘And thank you. Thank you so much.’

A little smile curled from the side of his mouth.

‘No one’s going anywhere down that lane. There’s trees down all over. Heard that it might have been a tornado.’

He grunted and she found a smile; Tom Jacobson was not the sort of man who believed things like that happened in England. ‘You’ll come back to mine and we’ll try and phone, although I doubt the lines have held up. In any case, you’ll be warm and dry and fed.’

For once in her life, Olivia didn’t argue.

The windscreen wipers of the old 4x4, even on double speed, did little to sweep the deluge of rain from the glass, but Tom didn’t seem to notice. He’s like a homing pigeon, she thought, running on instinct.

The sticky stuff on her face was blood from a small but deep cut at her hairline, but apart from this and a tender shoulder and hip, she had survived with nothing broken. At least something had gone her way today. The night clung outside like it was never going to give in. She was tired—bone tired—and found her head nodding as Tom pulled into the farmyard.

A light burned bright in the kitchen, the only glow in a landscape of grey gloom. From inside, a dog barked a welcome. A wet nose and a flurry of tail-wagging greeted her. The range filled the room with warmth and a little of the tension fell out of her shoulders. Tom disappeared upstairs whilst she looked around. In the centre of the kitchen and taking up most of the floor space stood an old table with a gnarled pine top, surrounded by six mismatched chairs with chintzy seat cushions. On top sat a vase of slightly wilted flowers and a farming magazine. A painted Welsh dresser with rows of china plates and a small stack of jams stood in the alcove near the door.

The clump of feet on the stairs announced Tom’s return. In his hands he had a towel, a quilted dressing gown, and a hand-knitted jumper. He held them out and she thought a slight blush rose in his cheeks, even with his ruddy complexion. The dog settled at his feet, its head raised in expectation.

‘I couldn’t find anything modern, but this will have to do. You can put your jeans in the tumble dryer through there.’ He pointed behind him. ‘Come, Jip. Time we did our last rounds.’ Jip bounced to his feet. Only a dog would be excited about going out in this weather.

‘I’ll be about ten minutes,’ said Tom. ‘You can put that pot of soup on to heat whilst I’m gone.’

Olivia sat in the strange kitchen, listening to the wind howling around the barn. She knew that if she put her head down on the table she would be instantly asleep, but she had to keep going. Stripping out of her wet things, she towelled her hair and wiped away the mud. It felt really odd standing there nearly naked, with the possibility that Tom could walk in any second. He had told her ten minutes, probably to let her know she had privacy for that amount of time. She wondered if checking things took that long, or would he be standing under an overhang, mentally ticking off the minutes. The thick jumper drowned her, falling to mid-thigh. At least that saved her from having to wear the hideous pink dressing gown.

Throwing her wet things in the tumble dryer, she cranked it up to high and flicked the switch. A plastic wash basket stood on top of the washing machine, filled with a jumble of clean work shirts and socks. Rifling through, she found a pair of woollen socks and pulled them on. Ollie would fall about laughing if he could see her now. An almost physical pang came from her chest. She had to get in touch with him. He would be worried sick. All of the drama of the morning seemed far away and of little importance. She would have given anything to be back at The Manor having an argument with Carver right now.

Padding through to the kitchen, she twiddled a few knobs until the burner lit under the soup and she leaned against the range, rubbing one socked foot on top of the other. Wafting up from under the lid came the satisfying smell of chicken soup.

The outside door rattled and about thirty seconds later, Tom came in with Jip at his heels. He took off his coat and hat and shook them. Jip took that for a sign and shook too, spraying water all over the floor.

She looked back, still stirring the soup and smiled. Tom was staring at her with his mouth slightly agape and there was an awkward silence. Jip broke it by barking and sitting at her feet, his head cocked to one side with his tongue hanging out.

Tom rubbed his eyes and took two bowls down from a cupboard. ‘He’s asking for his supper. Jip has a liking for chicken soup.’

Olivia pursed her lips as she continued to stir. Should dogs eat things like that?

‘You took me by surprise, Miss Olivia. It was as if the clock had been turned back forty years and it was my Betty standing there.’

She mentally kicked herself for not asking about Betty, who she knew from bits of overheard conversation wasn’t well at all. ‘Is she upstairs?’

‘No. She goes to her sister’s twice a week and stays over. Maureen has got lots of time and patience.’ He brought the bowls across and took a ladle down from the hood of the range. ‘I can’t be here for her when I have to do chores and keep the business ticking over.’

She watched through a haze of steam as he ladled two generous portions into each bowl and glanced away as his jaw started to tremble.

Tom brought a hunk of bread from the pantry as she sat. He tore off a corner and handed it to her. ‘No airs and graces in this house. Just good food.’

If that wasn’t permission to dunk then what was? She pulled her hair over one shoulder and dipped her spoon into the creamy broth. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Tom dip a chunk of bread about the size of her hand into his soup.

‘Tom, I really need to make that phone call after we’ve eaten.’

He continued to dunk the rest of his bread before answering. ‘I checked when I fetched those clothes. The lines are down. Even the mobile isn’t working. It’s this confounded weather.’

She sipped some of her soup before diving in as her stomach came to life. They ate in silence for a few minutes, punctuated only by the lashing of the rain against the window.

‘I need to ask a huge favour then. I need you to take me somewhere—to St Jude’s. Can you do that?’

He stopped eating and studied her face. She could feel his eyes scrutinising every gesture she made.

‘Is this to do with what happened all those years ago with Beth and young Gabriel?’

She nodded, not trusting her voice or her ability to make any sense if he demanded an explanation.

Tom stared out of the window and the cords in his neck tightened.

If he said no, she wasn’t sure what she was going to do.

Chapter Fifty-Four

Despite the horror of once again being pulled close to what he now knew was a vampire, Gabe clung on tightly. Folds of the cloak covered him, but occasionally he caught glimpses of trees moving past far too quickly—like a plane just before take-off.

His mind tried to process his newfound knowledge but it refused to fully accept the facts Clove had told him. There weren’t any synapses in the brain for dealing with stuff like this. But here he was, hanging onto something that had been dead for hundreds of years. Fear crawled into his throat. Why had he agreed to Clove’s proposition? Because he was right out of options.

Their chase slowed. The rustling of leaves came from underfoot and Gabe knew they must be in some kind of wood, but his sense of direction was skewed. Finally, Clove came to a halt and dropped his hold. The rain seemed finer here; the canopy of trees forming some protection, but it was pitch black. Gabe stretched out his arms and took a tentative step forwards.

‘Stay there.’ Clove’s voice was farther away than Gabe expected—he was no longer by his side. Gabe couldn’t decide if he was more scared with Clove near or far away. He desperately needed to piss. That act hadn’t been on his list of priorities all day.

A small, flickering light flared in the darkness. It drew closer and he could see the outline of Clove and a doorway. The light, though feeble, cast shadows on the stone walls around it.

Clove sighed. ‘Relieve yourself.’

‘You said you wouldn’t read my mind,’ Gabe blurted out the words without thinking.

‘I didn’t. Your stance tells me more than thoughts.’

A flush of colour rose in his cheeks. He found the nearest tree. Clove’s eyes drilled into his back as the hot stream crackled on the dry leaves below. After what seemed like an eternity, he stumbled back, groping his way up the worn stone steps.

Clove knelt in the crypt, one hand holding a small candle and one splayed out on the floor. His eyes were shut, and in the flickering light, the bones of his skull seemed to be pressing through his skin.

Gabe shuddered. ‘What’s wrong?’

Clove got up, a fluid movement seemingly uninfluenced by the movement of bone or muscle. He licked the end of his finger and thrust the stub of candle at him. ‘For your benefit.’ He paused. ‘It appears we have another problem. The two fledglings under my care are missing. They wouldn’t dare to leave if something catastrophic hadn’t occurred. And there is blood on the floor, human blood.’

Gabe’s mouth fell open. ‘There are more of you?’ His mind catapulted off into all of the fiction he had read and movies he had seen where vampires live in covens. But Carver had always said that the truth of anything paranormal would be so far from the Hollywood ideal that it would be hard to see any similarities.

‘Of course. Did you think I was a single anomaly? They are under my protection until they can prove to me they can fend for themselves.’

Gabe wondered who the unfortunate human had been. Someone out walking, caught by the storm and searching for shelter.

‘But there isn’t any trace of the human, I mean apart from the blood?’ The candle dripped wax onto his finger but he barely felt it.

‘So you think we eat all of our prey?’ The faintest hint of a smile played on Clove’s lips.

‘No...no...well...I don’t know.’ Gabe was trying very hard not to upset any equilibrium he had managed to forge but when you can’t see the line it’s hard not to cross it.

‘We only have need for the blood, so this person may have left these walls alive. They are what we call renegades. Such aberrations are rare and exist only for hours, locked in their own madness.’

Gabe shifted uncomfortably at the thought.

‘So why are we here? Did you get a message from one of your...fledglings?’

‘You ask a lot of questions, Master Davenport.’

‘Sorry...it’s the only way to learn. But I’ll stop, if you want.’ There he was again, rocking the little boat they were sailing on. And the sea was deep and cold and dark.

‘No, you do not have to stop. It is a long while since I conversed with someone human. I had forgotten that your knowledge is basic. I did not get a message as such, but something is amiss...’ Clove’s words trailed off as he fixed his eyes on the blackness outside.

Two figures emerged from the forest. Gabe held the candle in front of him as if it was some kind of weapon. He moved closer to Clove.

Tentatively, the figures approached—two boys, maybe around his age. Both were filthy. One cowered behind the other with his head down.

‘Explain.’ Clove’s voice was icy, controlled. Despite Clove’s proximity, Gabe’s legs trembled.

The young vampire in front brushed his dirty hair back from his face. His eyes fixed on Gabe for an instant.

‘Please don’t blame Teal. It was me. I took him outside. But I had to, she came from nowhere and she was bleeding...’

Gabe’s heart lurched. The young vampire’s eyes fell on him again and Gabe knew he had felt it too.

‘Did you feed from her?’ This time, there was no mistaking the anger in Clove’s voice.

Neither one of the young vampires spoke. Gabe saw two piercing blue-green eyes appear for a second and then they were gone.

They drew nearer and fell to their knees on the stone steps.

‘Don’t hurt Teal. He can’t help how he is.’

‘Do not tell me what I can or cannot do, Moth. You both broke the rules.’

The one called Teal kept his eyes fixed on the floor. His shoulders were trembling.

Clove motioned for Moth to stand.

Gabe hugged one arm around his body, digging his fingers into the flesh above his elbow. He had no reason to believe the human had been Beth, except for a terrible instinct that churned in his gut.

Clove grabbed a fistful of Moth’s hair and pulled his head back, exposing a pale column of neck. He lowered his face until it nearly touched Moth’s then grasped his throat with his other hand. ‘You are lucky that there are much more important things for me to do than punishing you.’ Teal whimpered at their feet. ‘I will warn you now: Gabriel here is very much out of bounds. If either of you so much as look at him the wrong way, I will tear out your throats without a second thought.’

Moth’s eyes bulged in his head as Clove’s fingers dug a little deeper, and then released.

Gabe watched in fascinated horror. His thoughts did cartwheels in his head. Part of him wanted to ask about the woman, but a bigger part didn’t. He might fall apart if he found out Beth was dead.

‘I fear we may have underestimated what wants you, Gabriel. It knows us all far too well. We need to get you to the house. Splitting everyone up seems to be its battle plan—and one it has succeeded with rather well. I’m going to throw you back in; you’re the prize and I want to draw it out.’

Clove put his hand on Gabe’s shoulder, just as the candle fizzled out. ‘I promise you that if the demon succeeds in entering your body, I will kill you myself.’

Chapter Fifty-Five

Thunder rumbled in the distance. Angry flashes of lightning pulsed behind clouds and the moon hung, fat and late summer ripe, in the sky. For now, the storm had calmed.

Beth dragged her feet through the wet grass. She felt strange; a sensation beyond tiredness had overtaken her limbs, masking even the chill, which went right through to her bones. Maybe she should have stayed in the little house with the boys. Did she know them? It was all too confusing. They weren’t much older than the boy in the manor house, Gabriel, but they were very dirty. Ella wouldn’t like them. But they seemed to know her, by the way they’d snuggled close and kissed her skin.

They had been frightened at first, cowering against the wall, but soon the blonder one had broken free and tip-toed across, taking one step forwards, then two back as though he was afraid of her. She had called to him, opening her arms, because no one should be scared. He had come willingly then, and she had wrapped her arms around his cold body, smoothing back his hair as he nuzzled against her. The dusty-haired boy hesitated longer, only approaching as a sudden exhilaration made her gasp, not quite in pleasure and not quite in pain.

Did she sleep after that? She wasn’t sure. But when she opened her eyes, they had gone and she’d felt cold, so cold.

The trees all looked the same as she searched for a path. She followed one blindly until she came to a wooden stile. An owl hooted nearby and she raised her head, hoping it was Secret. The stile proved difficult to climb, her foot felt heavy and kept slipping on the wet wood step. After a few failed attempts, she gave up and followed the fence as it led downhill. In the distance, the lights of The Manor twinkled like an oasis in the darkness.

Her chest hurt, a tightness that made breathing hard, and she couldn’t feel her fingers or her toes. When she got home she would be told off for going out without a jacket. Her lower lip trembled. She couldn’t even remember why she had left in the first place.

Her throat constricted and she had to stop every few steps, but every time she did, a wave of nausea wracked her body and she doubled over, a thin, sticky film of liquid dribbling from her lips. She must be very sick.

The slope levelled out then began to climb again. Her legs refused to carry her further than halfway up the incline. She collapsed into herself like a crumpled origami bird, the cold, wet earth strong in her nostrils. Her eyelids fluttered. Somewhere, the tinny lilt of music filtered through—The Animals Went in Two by Two—and behind her eyes, little orange lions marched in a line with their tails in the air.

Her husband’s voice called, as though coming from another room.

Beth smiled. He was telling her it was time to come home.

Chapter Fifty-Six

Inside the house, the mood was grim.

Carver and Ollie had made Noah as comfortable as they could, cleaning his burn and gashes and changing him out of his soaking clothes. He lay, fitfully asleep, on the sofa in the White Room, his limbs jerking under the wool blanket.

Any hopes Carver and Ollie had about Noah’s faith being their trump card lay dashed. And even though Carver wasn’t a religious man, the knowledge that God had deserted Noah right at his hour of need weighed on his already troubled mind. He tried not to think about Gabe and where he could be.

‘I can’t just sit here and do nothing. I feel like we’re waiting to be picked off, too.’ Ollie paced along the length of the room, his hair sticking up in clumps.

Carver barely heard him. He was sifting through the events of the day, trying to see if he had missed something vital, some small, inconsequential fact that might be the key to ending this mayhem. Suddenly, something hit him. His head jerked up.

‘There were two people in this house whom I didn’t ask about the disappearance of the box. Ella and Beth.’

Ollie stopped in his tracks. ‘It can’t have been Ella; she was too ill to move.’

As one they raced to the door, running down the hallway like two schoolboys, taking the stairs two at a time. Beth’s room was eerily silent now that the storm had eased. Moonlight pooled in, dappling the floor with milky light and casting an ethereal glow around the bed. The covers lay muddled, one pillow still bearing the imprint of her head. The room bore an incredible sense of loss.

He opened the door of the wardrobe and pulled things aside.

‘Oh, my God.’ Ollie’s voice came from behind. ‘It’s here, in Beth’s bed.’

They stood, inspecting the thing that had caused so much upset as Ollie voiced what they both were thinking. ‘Why would she take it? How did she know it was even there?’

‘I don’t know. But it was clearly important that she be made a part of all this. I could be running blind here, but locking this away might have been the worst thing I could have done.’

Ollie wiped his fingers down the front of his jeans and Carver understood. The box resonated with evil. To find it here, in a place of such innocence, made his throat tighten. Quickly, he stripped off one of the pillow cases and scooped it up from the bed, the weight of it like a corpse in his hands. ‘Let’s get back to Noah. He’s been by himself too long.’

Ollie closed the door quietly, as though Beth was still sleeping inside.

Gabe stood waiting for them at the bottom of the stairs.

***

Gabe had left Clove and his dysfunctional children outside. Clove had told him that it was up to him whether he told the rest of the house where he had been. Gabe imagined telling Carver and Noah he had befriended—if that was the right word—a small coven of vampires. Not that Moth and Teal were friendly. They had spent the whole journey back to the house scrutinizing him like he was something under a microscope.

‘Gabriel!’ Carver nearly dropped what he was carrying down the stairs. ‘Where the hell have you been?’

Here we go, decision time. ‘I had to try and look for Beth.’ The lie, and the irony of it, tripped off Gabe’s tongue like a song.

Carver thrust what he was carrying at Ollie. The young student grimaced.

Gabe found himself enveloped in a bear hug that nearly broke his spine as he became the focus of Carver’s full attention.

‘Just what part of ‘stay together’ didn’t you get, Gabe? We thought...’ Carver shook his head. ‘Never mind what we thought. Noah went out too, but at least he was prepared for the weather. Why doesn’t anybody listen to me anymore? Come through.’ He led the way to the back of the house, but Gabe didn’t miss the long look he got. Maybe his lie didn’t sound all that convincing after all.

Gabe got his first look at Noah from behind Ollie. A gasp of shock rose in his throat and he had to put his hand over his mouth. Noah stirred at their voices and raised himself up onto one elbow. He was the colour of bleached bone, which made the raw mark on his brow and the gashes on his cheeks stand out even more.

Gabe threw himself down in front of the couch and clasped the hand that was attempting to wave. ‘What happened?’

Noah pointed at Carver then grasped Gabe’s hand in both of his. A sheen of sweat glistened on his skin and his eyes looked sunken.

Ollie and Carver both filled Gabe in on what had happened since his departure. Although they didn’t say that Noah might have been hunting for him explicitly, he caught an underlying edge to their words. He remembered what Ollie had said to him about secrets and knew that he, too, was guilty of keeping them—now more than ever. How could he tell them about the vampires? Carver had spent his whole life delving amongst the supernatural, the macabre, explaining it as something that you didn’t play around with. And now here was Gabe, a fifteen-year-old kid who had bargained with the devil. Yet something about that didn’t ring true. Gabe didn’t think Clove was truly evil; otherwise, surely he would have attacked Gabe by now—though how could something dead be alive and good? It was a riddle his mind couldn’t digest. The confusion was heavy, pulsing, as if it had a life of its own.

‘So it was the bird that attacked Noah too?’ He had almost forgotten the incident this morning. It seemed so long ago.

‘It appears so,’ said Carver. ‘But it was no ordinary bird.’

Gabe’s eyes were drawn to the window, but there was nothing there but the darkness, tightly pressed against the panes as if it wanted to invade and swallow all the light.

Ollie slipped out briefly, and then reappeared with an armful of old books, dropping them onto the low, square table. ‘If the Internet is down, we’ll have to do this the old fashioned way. This is what I found on possession—and there’s a couple of passages that are animal specific. I know we’ve probably gone through these books before, but now that we know what we’re fighting, that should make it easier to find what we need, right?’ He pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose impatiently, looking from face to face.

Gabe was the first to pick up a book, a heavy leather-bound text called The Christian’s Guide to Demon Possession. He flicked through the first few pages. The words were as dry as the paper. This was going to be a long night, but at least it would keep his mind occupied. Still, he found that his gaze kept wandering to the windows.

A slow hour passed, all of them edgy. Noah dozed, occasionally waking to answer a question on theology. Ollie had one eye on his phone. Outside, the wind picked up and the rain began to hammer the roof once again.

Gabe couldn’t focus on the words. His eyelids drooped. Sleep sounded delicious. A few hours without having to think—it was nearly impossible to imagine the last time he’d felt that sort of weightlessness. He stretched, pulling his shoulders back and wincing. His muscles reminded him that he had fallen down stone steps just that morning.

Gabe’s gaze was drawn to the object Carver had carried down the stairs, still wrapped up. Ollie had put it by the door. ‘What’s that?’ He nodded towards it, one finger keeping his place in the book.

No one said anything. Noah opened his eyes at the heavy silence.

‘It’s what I was keeping in the vault, Gabe.’ Carver’s words were slow and measured as though he was choosing each one with great precision. ‘The box we found at the farmhouse after you and Beth were attacked.’

The bottom of Gabe’s world seemed to collapse and fall away. It had been here all along, then, the object he was told didn’t exist. Carver’s lips were still moving, but in Gabe’s ears, a high-pitched ringing blocked out any sound. He looked out the window. Clove stood outside, the wind lifting his dark hair across his pale face.

Gabe put his head in his hands.

Noah struggled into a sitting position. He put his hand on Gabe’s arm but Gabe couldn’t look at him.

‘Where did you find it?’ asked Noah quietly.

‘It was in Beth’s room. I have no idea how she even knew we still had it.’

Gabe raised his head. His cheeks were flushed.

‘Why did you keep it? Considering that’s what fucked up my family in the first place.’ His words came out razor-sharp, surprising even him. He was so tired—tired of second-guessing and wondering.

Carver paused. ‘Professionally, I couldn’t destroy something that may become of value to us in the future. Just because we didn’t find a definite link to what terrorised you and Beth all those years ago, that didn’t mean that we wouldn’t eventually. And because—’

‘You know something? I don’t care anymore.’ Gabe interrupted the man who had taken care of him his whole life.

Ollie looked away as the air between them became charged with tension.

Out of the corner of his eye, Gabe noticed something moving and his next words dried up in his throat. In the doorway stood Clove. Silence descended upon the room. Gabe wanted to stand, but his legs were suddenly boneless.

Finally, Clove broke the deadlock.

‘Forgive my interruption, gentlemen—but I cannot stand by and watch you all tear yourself to shreds.’ Clove clasped his hands together. ‘If you’re concerned, don’t be. Gabriel can vouch for my conduct.’

‘Who—what are you?’ Carver’s voice didn’t waver.

‘For now, know that I bear you no ill will. I am not human, which should not come as much of a surprise for learned men such as yourselves.’ He smiled and opened his hands.

Ollie’s eyes widened, owl-like, behind his glasses.

‘It’s okay.’ Gabe finally found his voice. ‘This is Clove. I was with him earlier. If he wanted to harm me, I’d already be dead.’ The intake of breath around the room was audible.

‘May I?’ Clove bent and removed the pillow case from around the box. He examined the outside of it, running his fingers over the etchings. He lifted the lid, then brought it to his face, inhaling the dank mustiness.

No one moved. No one was able to.

Tucking it under his arm, he approached Gabe and placed the box on his lap. ‘This is a skin. Think of it like a snake. The reptile sheds its skin. It was once a part of the entity, but now it is not.’

Gabe stared at the thing on his lap, the weight of it pressing against his jeans. It looked so inconspicuous. A frown creased his brow.

‘This box is wooden; it came from a living source. This was its host, which it needed to survive, as the bird is now its host.’

‘Was its host.’ Moth hovered in the doorway like his namesake. His gaze flickered over the room before alighting on Gabe. In his hands was the lifeless body of the bird.

Chapter Fifty-Seven

Olivia sat in the 4x4 beside Tom as it ploughed through the water-logged, narrow lanes.

‘Lines down over there.’ Tom nodded his head to the right.

‘How do you know?’ She spun round in her seat and peered into the gloom.

‘Headlights when we pulled out onto the road.’

She was beginning to realise that Tom was far more than the old farmer she had pinned him with. He hadn’t asked any more questions at the farmhouse, only insisted that they have a hot drink and wait for her clothes to dry. But he saw things—like the downed wires—and she wondered how much he had seen the day Noah rescued Beth and Gabe.

The vicarage was in darkness as the headlights arced past it. Tom stopped by the wooden lichgate at the entrance to the churchyard of St Jude’s. He handed her an old, heavy torch as she climbed down.

‘How do you know what you need is in the church?’

She paused, holding back her hair as the wind whipped it around her face. ‘I was told.’ It sounded pretty feeble. He deserved more. ‘Do you want to come with me?’

His dark grey eyebrows knitted together for a moment. ‘No, I reckon I’ll just sit here and make sure no one bothers you.’

‘Will I have to break in?’ She hadn’t thought about a key. Basic stuff. But she wasn’t in the habit of taking things from churches.

‘No, it should be open. Noah rarely locks it, but if he did, there’s a key under the mat.’

Olivia nodded and set off into the wind, her head down. She still couldn’t get over how trusting people were out here.

A small cenotaph stood on her left as she walked quickly under the lichgate. Her torch spotlighted a small burst of weathered red—last year’s poppy wreath. The church was old; it was recorded in the Domesday Book and had been here since Norman times. The moss-covered gravestones looked like they had been here almost as long. They leaned at odd angles, their bases choked by weeds. Olivia’s imagination spiked as she wondered who was buried there and how they had died. Something banged hard behind her and she wheeled around, holding her torch in front like a weapon. The lights on Tom’s 4x4 pierced the darkness. He had left them on for her.

The shingle pathway gave way to flagstones as she drew nearer to the church door. A single automatic spotlight flickered feebly on. It wasn’t much, but right now she didn’t need much to feel grateful.

Rain lashed her fingers as they closed around the latch. With a helping shove from her shoulder, the door creaked open. Blackness yawned in front of her, together with a smell of cold stone and—what was that? She wrinkled her nose. Beeswax.

She wished she had thought to ask Tom where the light switch was. St Jude’s wasn’t a large church, but the aisle seemed to stretch for miles down the length of her torch beam.

Her shoulder hurt. Her hip ached. Her heart didn’t want to feel anymore. Ollie would be frantic. Maybe she had dreamt the whole thing with Stu and this was just a fruitless trip to find nothing?

Olivia inched down the aisle, past the squat rows of wooden pews with purple and gold hassocks neatly piled at each end. She kept to the aisle, not wanting to creep past the stone sarcophagus that lay against the left hand wall. She had never liked those—not even in broad daylight, with the sun streaming through the high, stained-glass windows. When they’d all come for Christmas and Easter, she had made sure that the boys sat at that side.

She had no clue where to find what she was looking for. She wasn’t a church-goer; Olivia was more a girl who had faith in herself than anyone—or anything—else. God had always seemed to watch from the side-lines when she and Ollie were growing up. The plaster eyes of St Jude looked down on her coldly. This wasn’t the time to be thinking about what she believed in or not. Then, she remembered who he was—the patron saint of hope and impossible causes. So God, at least, did have a sense of humour.

The altar loomed, covered in a simple white cloth. Behind it, flashes of faraway lightning illuminated the stained-glass window. She pointed her torch to the right to find the steps to the lectern. Something fluttered right above her and the breath hitched in her throat. She angled the beam of light towards the rafters. Zig-zagging across the ceiling, she found the beady eyes of a confused pigeon looking down on her.

Olivia mounted the three steps that led to the altar. All of the disagreements she had had with Noah in the past came rushing at her, falling over themselves, making her squirm uncomfortably.

For God’s sake, focus! She snapped her mind back to the task at hand, trying not to think about blasphemy, or the hand of God, or every time she had ever sneered at Noah’s remarks.

On the left, in a small alcove invisible from the pews, was a single door. Her feet echoed in the stone stillness as she walked towards it. For the second time, she wished that Tom had come with her. That gruff, no-nonsense logic was something she desperately needed right now.

An old-fashioned latch adorned the door, the kind you depressed. At first, she thought it was locked and she gave a grunt of frustration. The latch clattered down with a noise that made her jump. A rush of camphor rose up to meet her and she was reminded of a time when she had hidden in an old chest when she was playing hide-and-seek with Ollie.

She cast the beam around the small room. A narrow bookcase stood against one wall next to a coat stand, a single plaid scarf hanging from one arm. Against the other wall was a small desk with an inlaid blotter. Behind that, a heavy curtain hung from a metal pole. With her heart hammering, Olivia pushed the curtain to one side. A row of Noah’s vestments hung from a similar pole that was slightly bowed in the middle. Some were covered in see-through protectors and Olivia recognised those she had seen at Christmas and Easter. Others were packed tightly together, more like the contents of a teenager’s wardrobe than a priest’s.

She bumped her hip on the edge of the desk and swore. There was nothing on the desk but a small wooden bowl with a cross etched into the base, and the desk drawers were locked. Olivia wanted to scream. She was getting nowhere fast and she had the panicky notion that timing was crucial. She had to get back to the house.

The door creaked and she spun round, adrenaline white hot in her veins.

A pair of oval-shaped green eyes regarded her coolly. The laugh that came from her throat sounded vaguely crazy, even to her own ears. Purr Snicketty, the church cat, wound himself around her ankles, his bushy ginger tail wavering. She bent down to stroke his head and he arched his back into her hand. His ears were notched from fights he’d had defending his territory.

‘Hey, Purrdy.’ Olivia’s voice was barely more than a whisper, but who—or what—she was hiding from, she didn’t know.

The beam of her torch cast a glow behind the door. There was an ancient plant stand with bowed legs. On its top was a simple vase.

And in that vase was what she had come for.

Chapter Fifty-Eight

Moth shifted uncomfortably as all attention wheeled round to focus on him and what he was carrying.

Clove regarded the dead bird with no expression on his pale face, then his brows knitted together. ‘Gabriel, come here.’

‘He isn’t yours to order around,’ Carver blocked Gabriel’s path.

Clove sighed. This was proving difficult. This is why he had no contact with the human race unless he wanted to be fed. But he had no choice; he couldn’t stand by and watch them tear themselves to shreds. That would weaken them, which was exactly what this demon wanted. A quick delving into their thoughts showed him how unstable they were. But he kept to his word and didn’t intrude on Gabriel.

Gabriel pushed past. ‘It’s okay. He wants to help us.’

Clove didn’t miss the long look between Gabriel and Moth. He wondered where Teal was; normally, he was glued to Moth’s side. The situation with the woman in the crypt bothered him. It was hard for him to be too angry. His rules only said they weren’t allowed out by themselves. Being forced out by someone intruding hadn’t occurred to him.

He put his hand on Gabriel’s shoulder and Carver flinched.

‘So the demon has left this host—which means that, as yet, we don’t know what it is using. It might try to take over someone here, although together we have strength and unity. It will feel that. I don’t think it will try anything when I am here but,’ he shrugged, ‘anything is possible.’

‘One of us is missing,’ said the man on the couch—the man with the crucifix branded into his skin. The priest. ‘Gabe’s mother, Beth. She disappeared hours ago. Will you help us look for her?’

‘What was she wearing the last time you saw her?’ Clove asked.

‘Only a thin summer dress. You would know if you had seen her. Her hair is white.’

Moth shifted, the slightest of movements that Clove sensed rather than saw. Gabriel tensed, as though he was steeling himself for bad news. So that’s why he’d acted oddly at the crypt. He knew there was a chance his mother had been the victim. Clove regretted his earlier promise. It was a lot easier when he could slip in and out of thought patterns.

‘Go find your brother, Moth.’

He bent his head and whispered against Gabriel’s ear, running his open palm across the boy’s face. Gabriel collapsed into his arms like a deck of cards. Clove carried him to an over-sized chair and placed him carefully into it, curling Gabe’s limp legs over the side.

‘What the hell have you done to him?’ Carver’s voice hissed at him from behind.

‘I’m letting him rest. He is exhausted. This is what the demon wants, for Gabriel to have no fight left in him.’

Clove omitted to say that with Gabriel asleep, no one would find out about Beth.

Chapter Fifty-Nine

Aka Maga swirled under the door of Beth’s room, free of the encumbrance of living flesh and pulsing with rage.

The bird had finally taken its last breath through sheer exhaustion, and although Aka Maga was irritated by its loss, it had served its purpose in gaining Beth’s trust. The demon rose and fell in its smoke-like stance, celebrating in the energy and mayhem it had created. It felt strong enough to take its wooden prison and destroy it once and for all. Then, it could never again be trapped and silenced.

Long, long ago, when superstition was a god, Aka Maga had been human. Born to a handmaiden of a royal household, he was snatched away as a small child and sold into slavery. On the shores of The Dead Sea stood a temple, and it was there that he was taken and schooled in his duties.

The child grew to be a favourite of the priestess. She bathed him in perfumed oils and fed him sweetmeats from her fingers. At the age of fifteen, she took him into her bed and taught him how to pleasure her. But the nation was at war and the temple stood for everything that the opposing enemy loathed. One night, the temple defences fell and the city burned around them. When soldiers burst into the chambers of the priestess, she tipped a vial of poison to her lips. She was dead before they ripped the curtain from around the bed.

He was not so fortunate. The general, Joab, enraged by the suicide of a bargainable hostage, ordered the boy to be hung from his wrists in the centre of the market square. Before they fastened the rope around him, he begged for his life, telling them he was only a slave carrying out orders from his mistress. They only laughed in his face and stripped him of his fine clothes.

A crowd gathered despite the flames, baying for blood and grateful that they were not the focus of Joab’s attention. Before they hoisted him onto the lower branches of the killing tree, Joab sliced off the boy’s tongue and then castrated him. It took the boy over twelve hours to die. But Joab was not finished. Just before the boy’s last breath, Joab produced his own priest, a sorcerer of sorts. His magic was of a dark and dismal kind, his incantations devilish and devious. The boy’s dying breath was captured by the old man’s mouth, his rotting teeth the last scent the boy ever remembered.

The priest spat into a box, a simple carved affair. He took a knife and disembowelled the boy, shaking blood from his fingers into the box. An incantation as dark as the smoke filled sky above, and the boy’s fate was sealed. His soul, forever damned, would be held in the wooden confines. The priest forbade him ever to take over the body of a man, a lasting curse that the boy should never know the satisfaction of existing as an adult male.

Decades passed before the spirit of that boy amassed enough energy to leave the box. Insects became the host of choice, then small reptiles, snakes and finally birds. The latter proved to be invaluable in scheming and drawing powerful men to their deaths. But it always had to return to the box. Now, after centuries of trials and errors, its time had come.

Gabriel would be the perfect host—an almost man with the intelligence and strength of character to corrupt and mould to its own dark desires. It would take its revenge on religion and armies. It had been abandoned by the women it trusted and abused and tortured by men in the name of gods and Kings. The need for vengeance had devoured its once innocent heart and left a corpulent, stagnant hole. Where once light had danced, now darkness reigned.

Aka Maga curled under the covers on Beth’s bed, its smoky fingers slipping through the pale fabric, leaving small, wriggling maggots in its wake. It searched vainly, and then rose into a column of agitated darkness. A noise, unlike anything human or animal, came from its centre, a terrible despairing rage. An empty glass on Beth’s bedside table shattered.

It ripped, scattering itself into a thousand pieces then regrouping again. This time, the tendrils of smoke clung together, a black ball of violent and thwarted energy, hell bent on destruction.

It tore through the closed door, ripping the hinges from the wood and sending it crashing to the floor. At the top of the stairs, it folded into itself, becoming smaller for a moment as it grew to understand what was happening within.

No longer existing purely on the black hate that had kept it focused through the centuries, something impossible was taking place. Now, just before the battle for the soul of Gabriel Davenport, something pulsed within it.

Aka Maga’s heart was beating.

Chapter Sixty

Moth was happy to be out of the room where too many heartbeats sounded in his ears. Hunger gnawed at his bones like a small animal.

A gauntlet of emotions ran riot in his head. Relief ran the highest. Since the appearance of the woman in the crypt, everything had turned to shit fast. His attempt to keep Teal away from her had failed. His blood was good, but compared to the living warmth of something human it was like offering Teal stale bread when a banquet lay in the corner. She had come to them like a prayer, inviting, warm, and unafraid. His tongue darted over his lips, remembering.

So being alive, or technically still being undead, was a bonus. Clove was angry, but not quite as angry as he had expected. Maybe when things calmed down the repercussions would fly, but right now he would become Gabriel’s wet nurse for Clove. He wiped the back of his hand over his mouth, wandering down the hallway, his worn shoes squeaking on the polished black and white tiles.

He didn’t like Gabriel at all. He didn’t like the way Clove pandered to him. What made him different anyway? To Moth, he was just another meal ticket.

But Moth wasn’t stupid. He had a fine intelligence that he didn’t normally show. He listened and stored stuff in his head. He knew there was something evil out there that could pose a threat, perhaps even to their race. The trouble was that Teal didn’t know—or rather, that Teal’s attention had been taken up by all of the shiny things in the house. Moth didn’t care where he slept or what he wore, but Teal had come from finer things and the draw was still there and whilst his head was full of glitter, he didn’t have any room for instinct. Teal by himself in a place like this was an accident waiting to happen. Moth sighed and poked his head around the nearest door. It would be easier to call him mentally, but Teal wasn’t so good at that.

He was glad to be free of the dead bird. There was something about it that made him feel like it was poisonous. He kept telling himself that it was only a mass of feathers and bones, but for the first time since he had been turned, something dead had repulsed him. Is this what humans felt?

This house unnerved him, and not just because of the people in it or the threat of the entity. It was as if the ghosts of those who had lived here clung to its fabric. Maybe they were more than happy to still be tied to a place that would welcome them with open arms. Moth knew a lot about the supernatural. Teal read to him, sometimes all night long or until his voice had become so hoarse that Moth had to let him stop.

All the doors at this level of the house were closed and Moth’s heart fluttered as he opened each one and looked inside. Vampires weren’t meant to be frightened, but he and Teal had been made by weakness. They were at the lower level of the dark side, with tiny fangs and not that many special qualities. In time their fangs would grow but until then, Clove was their provider and teacher. He rubbed his forehead with his fingers, leaving a dirty smear.

Moth back-tracked, his steps taking him past the room where Clove and all the humans were. Clove glanced up as he stole past, not losing a beat in the words he was speaking, but no one else noticed. The smell of blood made his mouth water.

The hallway narrowed a little and off to the left, a chink of light spilled out through a gap between two double doors. Teal sat in a brocade-upholstered armchair, his legs dangling over the chair arm. Strands of matted blond hair hung over his face but he hardly seemed to notice them. A book lay open on his lap, his finger tracing the words as he concentrated. Moth paused mid-step, not wanting to break the spell. Teal was a pretty pathetic excuse for a vampire but Moth was stuck with him for a brother. And after what had happened to Sasha, they were all one another had left.

Moth pushed the door open enough to slip in and Teal looked up, his bright eyes dazzling in the lamp glow. Moth scanned the row of spines stacked neatly on shelving that stood floor-to-ceiling on two walls.

‘I might have known I would find you with your nose in a book.’ He grinned. Teal had a hard job judging when he was serious or not.

‘This one is a first edition, look.’ A leather spine was pointed in his direction. ‘How can they have so many? There’s more than anyone could read in a lifetime.’ A shadow passed over Teal’s face. Coming to grips with what he was hadn’t come easy.

‘Clove wants us back to play happy families.’

Teal sighed and closed his book. Both of them knew that what Clove wanted, he got.

‘The bird’s dead, by the way. I found it outside on the path, so we’re on the lookout for its new host.’

Teal eased himself out of the chair, his fingers idling on the raised velvet pattern for a few seconds. Moth pretended he hadn’t seen.

‘Bring the book with you. They won’t mind. And if they do, tough.’

‘I don’t like being here, Moth. It feels wrong. Bad things are happening here.’

Moth felt the same way but he wasn’t going to admit it. He held open the door. ‘Just bring the damn book and let’s get back.’

Side by side like two creatures from the ark, they walked back slowly, neither of them wanting to be under the scrutiny of strangers.

Without warning, Teal stumbled, dropping the book and clawing at his head with his fingers. His face contorted in pain. Moth slammed down his mental shields so fast it almost made him dizzy. He expected Clove to race around the corner, but when he didn’t, he did the only thing he could. He grabbed hold of Teal and hauled him to his feet then took off at a run, dragging Teal along with him. He wasn’t staying around to find out what happened next.

Chapter Sixty-One

Clutching her find under her jacket, Olivia ran down the silent, dark church aisle as though every nightmare from her childhood was nipping at her heels. She kept her gaze focused on the black hole at the end where she knew the door was, her torch beam now no more than a thin yellow light. Her imagination went wild. The eyes of all the plaster statues and glassy features in the windows were watching, just waiting for her to trip and then...she hit the door with a bit too much force and scrabbled for the handle, splitting her fingernail too close to the nail bed. She yelped in pain and tore open the door. The night air hit her face, sweet and cool.

Her feet slipped on the wet gravel as she sped down the path, the two yew trees which framed it blocking her view of where Tom had parked the 4x4. But she knew he was there. Underneath her jacket, the strange steal from the church lay against her shirt, the edges scratching her skin. He saw her as she rounded the corner, the lych-gate thudding back against itself on the latch.

Tom’s face was the most welcome thing she had seen in a long time. He started the engine before she had even opened the door, nodding as his eyes took in her arm clasped across her chest.

They sat in silence until the church had been swallowed up behind them by the night. Olivia stared out of the window, watching the wiper blades swishing across the windscreen. The sweet aroma of hay wafted up from the back seat.

‘You get what you wanted?’ Tom kept his eyes on the road, his gnarled knuckles gripping the wheel tightly.

She pulled open her jacket and laid her find on her lap, half hoping they would take on some magic glow to at least tell her she wasn’t crazy for having dashed out in the tail end of a storm, on the advice of a man who had been dead for fifteen years.

Tom glanced across and grunted.

She didn’t know what that meant. She was beginning to think she didn’t know what anything meant anymore. A lump formed in her throat and she stared out of the side window, resting her cheek against the glass.

Tom slowed the 4x4 and wound down his window. A gust of drizzle-laced wind hurtled in, lifting the fine white hair on the side of his head. Olivia peered out to where the headlight beams cut through the night. What looked like a river ran down the switchback known as Pool Bank.

Tom tutted. His mouth twisted into a grimace.

‘Never known the stream to burst through like this,’ he said, more to himself than to Olivia. ‘But a bit of water won’t stop this old girl.’ He patted the front of the dashboard as though it was a prize cow and Olivia smiled in spite of feeling like she was falling apart.

They crawled up the hill, the water running underneath them, as though they were in a boat. Occasionally, the wheels lost traction and they slid a little. She held her breath, the memory of her own accident still fresh in her mind. The road turned back on itself sharply. This was where the water gushed the quickest, emptying over the banking like a waterfall. Tom slammed the 4x4 into first gear and the engine whined. The main beam of the headlights cut through the hawthorn hedge along the left side of the road, and she saw a startled rabbit shoot back underneath, its pale bobtail stark against the blackness.

Slowly, they started to slide backwards and she tensed, her hand grabbing the side of the seat. Tom took one hand off the steering wheel for a moment and clasped her shoulder, then flicked a switch on the dashboard. The wheels spun and managed to find some grip. Finally, at a snail’s pace, they were moving again. To their right, in the dip where the stream normally skirted, the faint glow of lights could be seen. From her vantage point near the apex of the hill, the white flickering glow of a TV screen reminded her that some people were doing ordinary things on this, the wildest night the village had seen in decades. She ran her fingers over the coarse surface of the objects in her lap, wanting to make sure they hadn’t evaporated into thin air.

Tom cleared the hill and chuckled, a pleased-with-himself sound that was clearly intended for his car, rather than his own merits.

The Manor stood three fields away as the crow flies but the main road snaked the perimeters, passing the canoeing club and crossing the river before leading onto The Lane. It was a good three miles on that route and parts of it were littered with fallen trees. She knew Tom would have to take the narrow farm road that the milk tankers used when Beth’s house was a working farm cottage.

Her heart rate spiked. Gut instinct told her something horrible had happened at the place she called home.

They hadn’t been on the farm track for long before Tom suddenly braked and the 4x4 juddered to a halt. Her head jolted against the headrest, scattering the thoughts she had been trying to gather.

Tom climbed out and stood in the light arcs from his headlights, his hands on his hips. Olivia opened her door and looked out, her foot planted on the door’s footrest.

The road, which was barely more than a dirt track, lay before them. But it wasn’t a road, only a great, gaping black hole where the road once had been.

Chapter Sixty-Two

Gabe dragged himself out of a deep sleep. His whole body ached, including his eyes, which were right now trying to focus on the scenario in the White Room. If it wasn’t so messed up, the situation would be funny.

Carver and Ollie sat side by side, their faces nearly as pale as Clove’s as he loomed over them, his presence as imposing as his height. They seemed to have relaxed a little and Carver’s eyes were animated, as though finally meeting the objects of years of study was just about sinking in.

Noah occupied the other sofa. His eyes were closed but he wasn’t sleeping. The angry brand on his forehead glistened in the lamp light.

‘Ah, Gabriel.’ Clove pretended he had just noticed Gabe was awake, although Gabe suspected he had known the moment his eyes were open.

‘Moth, why don’t you get acquainted?’ Clove inclined his head. Moth and Teal sat on the floor by the French doors, the closest they could get to outside.

If there was anyone in the room Gabe didn’t want to get acquainted with, it was Moth. He sat up and swivelled his legs onto the floor. His ploy was to insert himself between Ollie and Carver so that if Moth did come closer, he would at least have company. But he only managed two steps before his knees buckled. Clove caught him before he hit the floor.

Gabe found himself swept up, powerless to stop the momentum that ended with him being deposited beside Moth.

‘Play nicely. There’s enough to worry about outside this room without any more antagonism.’

It was a sensible and truthful statement with which neither Gabe nor Moth could argue.

Clove pulled Teal to his feet and inspected the book still clutched to his side. He pointed to the leather chair by the hearth, giving Teal permission to indulge. Teal didn’t need to be told again. He nearly skipped to the chair, opening the pages before he curled up onto the seat.

Which left Gabe alone with Moth. There was a long, awkward silence. Gabe could feel the resentment bristling from the young vampire. And it went both ways. He hugged his knees and stared straight ahead, but Moth was in his peripheral vision. The fine layer of dust on his skin and in his hair made it look as if he had been in some kind of desert storm. He didn’t look much older than Gabe was, but that didn’t mean anything—he was a vampire. The word clanged in Gabe’s head like a warning bell. Wasn’t he supposed to be running from the danger outside, not creating new ones inside?

Moth dropped his head onto his knees then turned to stare at him. Moth’s eyes were strange, one grey and one dormouse brown. Now it was Gabe’s turn to stare, but the anger that flared up made him drop his gaze.

‘Why did you pull us into your mess?’ The venom dripped from Moth’s tongue.

For a second, Gabe was speechless—but only for a second. A white hot flash of anger surged up from his stomach and hurled itself out of his mouth. He forgot about what Moth was. He forgot about anything but the fact that he was trying his fucking hardest, but that never seemed to be enough.

‘I didn’t “pull” anyone. I never asked for Clove’s help and I sure as hell didn’t ask for yours. It might have escaped your grasp, but there’s enough going on here without me bothering about whatever little grudge you’ve got against me.’

Moth shrugged as Gabe’s fury settled over him in a cloud of hissed words. Clove watched them both whilst carrying on a conversation with Carver.

‘A grudge? Is that what you think this is?’ Moth’s eyes darkened.

‘What else am I supposed to think?’ Gabe was all out of being nice and all out of being intimidated. If Moth and he were truly alone he might have curtailed his feelings, but with Clove here it was hardly likely that Moth would bite back. He laughed at that thought and Moth shot him another black glance.

‘Your kind and my kind don’t mix. This isn’t one of those pathetic stories where we all find peace and harmony. I’d rather rip your throat out than make small talk.’

‘Moth. Enough.’ A sharp retort from Clove clammed up anything else Moth was going to say.

Gabe was physically shaking. It took all of his self-control not to launch himself at Moth. ‘Thanks for the honesty. At least I know where I stand. I doubt whether you had much more compassion when you were alive.’ His words were meant to hurt and for an instant, that emotion registered on Moth’s face before being replaced by the hard mask.

‘Gabe?’ Noah’s hoarse voice came from the sofa. ‘Come over here.’ A hand appeared above the sofa arm and beckoned him.

Gabe didn’t need any more encouragement. He left Moth to brood and settled himself by Noah. He had nearly forgotten about Noah’s ordeal, which was unforgiveable. Gabe clasped his hand.

‘How are you feeling?’ It was a stupid question. The man had been attacked by something that shouldn’t exist. How did that even feel when all your faith was in God?

Noah wet his lips with the tip of his tongue.

‘Don’t waste your focus on Moth—or anything else in this room, Gabriel.’ His eyelids fluttered as though he was having trouble keeping them open. ‘The evil out there wants you. Don’t assume they can—or will—help.’

The glass rattled in the windows as a hard gust of wind blasted against it. Gabe jumped and saw Moth smirking. Noah squeezed his fingers tightly.

A cold dread settled itself around Gabe’s shoulders. The odds in his favour had dropped again. Now there were two things baying for his blood.

***

Aka Maga hesitated at the top of the staircase. The young vampires were prowling downstairs but they were insignificant and proved no threat. It had tested the meeker one in case his quietness held a reserved power, but it found him weak and pitiful.

The rest, including its prize, were bundled together in one room. Safety in numbers, they assumed. The thought of the master vampire caused a deep heat to well up inside its life force and its new heart swelled, not with blood but with centuries of negative energy.

After all of the years of waiting for a perfect host, it would not compromise success by taking Gabriel when the vampire was present and on guard. Let them all wait and wonder. The power of fear grew stronger when imagination over ran common sense, it knew that all too well.

Aka Maga basked in its newfound strength, testing the forces cavorting inside its form by splitting and reforming, scattering its atoms throughout the upper storey of the house then pulling them back into the concentrated ball of black power. Deep inside its rotting core, it was exhilarated. It was more than ready.

The grandfather clock chimed the hour. 2 a.m. A little beyond the witching hour this place revolved around.

For once, it was waiting for the light—for the minutes right before dawn when the vampires would have to retreat, skulking away like dogs with their tails between their legs, into their black holes.

Then, at that moment when they were powerless, it would enter Gabriel Davenport, making sure they all saw his surrender, his terror. It would thank the man, Carver, for nurturing its host so well. It would laugh in the face of the priest who lay broken in spirit. It would make Gabriel scream his new name for all to hear.

Then, it would instruct him to kill them all.

It slid under a door, a black churning mass of hate and shadow.

And it waited.

Chapter Sixty-Three

Ollie excused himself by saying he was slipping upstairs to grab his phone charger. The look Clove gave him nearly incinerated him in his tracks.

He was excited, more excited than he could ever remember. Things he had believed in all of his life were actually true! It was if fate had vindicated all of the hours he had spent looking for that one perfect clue. The thing that would open the door to other worlds. But it was tempered by a dull hollow of concern for his sister and for Gabe. Those two emotions didn’t play nicely together and he wanted to get away to clear his head. Under Clove’s watchful eye, even thinking seemed to have no privacy.

He ran up the stairs, glad that someone had left the lamp on the console table lit. Someone moved along the hallway below and he spun round, staring through the open balustrades. It was Moth, no doubt sent by Clove. The way he was looking was anything but friendly. A memory flashed through Ollie’s mind of Purr Snicketty stalking a mouse in the graveyard last Easter. It had been a beautiful spring day, daffodils brushing against old tombstones in the warm, balmy wind.

Ollie slipped inside the nearest room—Olivia’s—wanting to be out of view from any downstairs scrutiny. Her towel lay crumpled across the bed from her morning shower and unpartnered shoes lay scattered on the floor. She was the untidy one; Ollie had a bad case of OCD. And people say twins are the same. The smell of her perfume still hung in the air and a pang of distress shot through his chest.

He sat on the bed and put his head in his hands, pressing his fingertips under his glasses, against his eyelids. He wanted not to think for just a few minutes.

The scent from the perfume pressed against his senses, deep and woody with a hint of smoke. Olivia didn’t wear florals; she preferred something with strength and attitude. She called it her ‘don’t fuck with me’ calling card.

His head throbbed, even his bones ached. Downstairs were vampires. Freaking vampires. He should be asking questions and documenting, studying their reactions and their conversation. This was proof his whole life wasn’t wasted, that his decision to enter the research of the paranormal wasn’t the decision of a deluded mind that would have curled up and died with a normal nine-to-five job.

His stomach churned and he swallowed the urge to be sick. The scent clung to the inside of his nostrils. When did he last eat? The pizza? No, he hadn’t eaten any. That seemed like days ago. In the kitchen, before the storm with Gabe...

Ollie’s fingers tingled as he remembered the pressure of Gabe’s head against his chest and his warm hands clinging onto Ollie’s shirt. The way the sun had caught the planes of his face, highlighting the tears on his cheeks. His fingers clutched the sheets and he groaned, rocking backwards and forwards, letting his imagination run riot. Kissing Gabe would be like tasting honey straight from the comb. Nothing should taste that good and be natural.

His hand went to the front of his jeans, popping the buttons and freeing himself. He lay down on his sister’s bed with her perfume in his lungs and imagined slipping his tongue between Gabe’s lips, nudging him to respond. He imagined the sounds he would make, the soft moans and the urgent begging. A new train of thought burst through the fog in his mind: maybe this was all Gabe’s fault. Olivia leaving was linked to the box, and the box was linked to Gabe. The house had been fine until he caught Gabe lurking down near the vault. Yes, it was making more sense now.

The thought receded, leaving only the intense, almost painful pleasure of a hard on he had tried to bury all day. This time there was no gentle kissing. Gabe writhed underneath him, slick with sweat, his innocence falling away like water. This time, Ollie mentally fucked Gabe until he made him bleed.

Chapter Sixty-Four

Olivia clung onto the grab handle above the passenger door like a drowning woman hanging onto a rock. Her teeth were clenched together so tightly she thought they might all disintegrate if she relaxed. Her body, already battered and bruised by the accident, was taking another onslaught as the 4x4 bounced its way over the ruts in the field.

Tom hadn’t let the sinkhole faze him for long. She had followed him, climbing into the car with a rage she hadn’t thought possible, a string of expletives tripping from her tongue. He had stared at her, twisting his mouth into a grimace.

‘You could run a small country on the energy you put into cussing, Miss Olivia.’

Whilst she was digesting that statement, he crunched the 4x4 into first and calmly drove through the five-bar gate on their right. Splinters of wood hit the windscreen and she ducked. Her head hit the interior of the roof as the vehicle lurched and she grabbed the handle, looking at him as if he was a madman. Or a saviour. Or both.

She thought any hope of getting to The Manor was sunk into the depths of that hole, but here was Tom again, coming to her rescue. The vehicle slid sideways as they listed down the hill towards the beck, which ran between two fields. The climb resumed until the field levelled out as it ran towards the boundary of the house. She’d walked this way countless times, but it was all new and unsettling in the damp darkness. To their right was the wood with its army of silver birches, standing sentinel on the hill.

‘I owe you, Tom.’ The words chattered through her teeth as they bounced over the churned-up ruts from the tractor. She wanted to say much more, but maybe that would come later when all this was over, when they were safe. If that time ever came. She bit her lip and stared hard out of the windscreen, her eyes on the bouncing headlight beams.

‘There’s good in you, girl, underneath all those prickles. Reminds me of my Betty.’

She didn’t look across, but she knew there were tears in his eyes.

Tom stopped at the base of the hill. The beck, which was usually no more than a trickling stream, had tripled in size and the water ran quickly. Debris, washed down from the slopes, littered the water with windfall branches. A dry stone wall that separated the pastures had partially collapsed, and sizeable stones jutted out of the stream bed.

They sat in silence with only the sweep of the wiper blades as a background.

‘Can you get through that?’

‘Shouldn’t be a problem. I’m just giving the old beast a breather. She hasn’t worked this hard since that snowstorm.’

That snowstorm, the one fifteen years ago. All the locals called it that. Anything since was only a flurry, even if it lasted for days. Everything always went back to that time, she thought.

Tom started up the engine, but this time it coughed as it spluttered into life. He studied the dials on the dashboard and grunted. Slowly, he edged towards the fast-moving water, his eyes scanning for a crossing point. She pointed to a place where only a few rocks poked out. The slope at the other side looked like a mountain.

The 4x4 lurched into the water and shifted sideways with the flow. Tom corrected it, keeping his foot down on the accelerator so it didn’t stall. One wheel hit a rock. She held her breath and almost cheered as the tyre found grip and scrabbled over. Only a few more feet and they would make the opposite bank.

The engine whined in protest as Tom asked for more power. The inside of the cab began to steam up with their breath. Olivia leaned forward and rubbed the windscreen clear with her hand. The smell of burning wires wafted up through the vents.

A sudden surge of water carried them downstream for a moment and the 4x4 hit the side of a fallen log hidden under the current. Tom wrestled with the wheel.

‘Come on, come on, just a bit more, old girl.’

Olivia repeated it in her head. If sheer will could get them across, they would fly.

The revs of the engine juddered and paused, then juddered again. It cut out for the final time, its last breath belching out of the exhaust pipe in a cloud of smoke.

Chapter Sixty-Five

Moth was taking too long.

Clove sat with his back to the door, watching Carver and Noah deep in conversation. Their voices were hushed but he could hear every word. It didn’t seem important that they know that. Noah’s eyes darted to Clove occasionally. For a man of God, there was too much uncertainty in their depths.

Clove listened for Moth’s footfall and found it in Gabriel’s bedroom, but Ollie wasn’t with him. Clove’s mouth narrowed. After this was over, he would have to make an example of Moth. He must know his place. Their survival depended on following rules, and right now, Moth appeared to be flaunting every single one.

The animosity between Gabriel and Moth concerned him. He hadn’t anticipated a bond— far from it—but this active dislike was trouble waiting to happen. As was this waiting. He fully expected a confrontation with the demon before now. It was too full of rage to back away for long, and too powerful to be intimidated by his presence ad infinitum. But he could feel it prowling and smell its decay wafting through the house.

Teal had abandoned his book for now, although he still carried it under one arm. He was standing in front of an oil painting—a village scene—his expression one of rapt pleasure. He reached out his hand and touched the surface of the oils, his finger tracing the tiny dips and swirls.

Clove knew taking Teal under his wing could be seen by some as a mistake. He was weak, an unnecessary burden, and the runt of the vampire litter he had hunted down. But there was something about those eyes, a uniqueness that picked away at the back of Clove’s mind, something that didn’t give him any pleasure. But right now, he kept Moth in check and gave him something to look after.

Gabriel sat huddled in a chair, as far away from everyone that he could get. Although he appeared to be brooding, Clove knew that the boy was aware of every tiny movement in the room. What was it like for him, waiting to be taken, waiting to die? Something that could have been empathy fluttered in his chest, but it vanished in an instant. The boy was brave; going outside like that took courage. Clove had told Gabriel he would help in the fight against the demon, but if it came down to it, the most important thing was destroying it. If Gabriel got caught in the crossfire, he would have to be a necessary casualty.

Clove’s patience was wearing thin. He was beginning to tire of being the pawn in this battle.

Gabriel glanced up as Ollie’s shadow darkened the door. There was no sign of a phone charger in his hand.

Clove studied his face. Ollie was sweating, the small beads of perspiration glistening on his brow and upper lip. Clove inhaled and caught the chlorine tang of semen. That was strange. There was no one else upstairs but Moth.

Ollie wiped the back of his hand over his face as Gabriel beckoned him over. ‘Did you find your charger?’

‘No...I looked, but Olivia must have it.’ The lie was so obvious that even Carver and Noah stopped talking for a moment. Ollie chewed the edge of his thumbnail and shuffled his feet, before leaning down and whispering something in Gabriel’s ear.

‘Anyone want a drink?’ Gabriel was out of the chair and halfway out of the room with Ollie at his heels.

The hairs at the nape of Clove’s neck bristled. He lowered his breathing rate and ran his tongue over the edge of one sharp fang. Gabriel stood in front of the fridge with the door open. He picked up a can from the top shelf and handed it to Ollie, before taking one for himself. Everything appeared normal, but something seemed to be drawing all the air from the room.

The lights flickered twice and a noise like the skittering of a thousand tiny feet whispered up from between the floorboards.

Teal ran to his side, his eyes wide and fearful.

‘Where’s Gabe?’ said Carver as the noise grew. His arm was around Noah’s shoulders. Noah’s hands were clasped to his ears.

The French doors rattled in a sudden blast of wind, the catch giving as they flew open, the fine linen curtains billowing out into the room like spectral fingers.

Every sense in Clove’s body shifted into overdrive. The presence settled over the room. It permeated the air they were breathing, filling their lungs with its toxicity. But it had no form, no centre, and there was nothing to fight. The noise grew to a crescendo, so loud that it drowned out all reason and thinking. Clove slammed his mental shields down fully, but not before a worm of hate slithered inside. Walk away, vampire. This is not your fight. Take your children and run. I am Death. Even for your kind.

‘Gabriel. Come here, now.’ Clove rarely raised his voice, but there was no mistaking the urgency in his tone.

Above the terrible sound, something laughed.

He strode to the kitchen, still wrestling with the voice in his head. The fridge door stood open, light pooling out onto the floor.

But Ollie and Gabriel were gone.

Chapter Sixty-Six

Olivia’s feet sank into the slope as her hands clawed for grip. The hill wasn’t steep, but the rain had turned the hillside into an angled ice rink of mud. She yelped as her damaged fingernail hit a stone. Inside her zipped-up jacket, the palm crosses itched against her skin. They were homemade, with frayed edges. She still didn’t know how they could help.

Tom hadn’t wanted to let her go off alone, but there was no way she was going to ask him to try and make it across the fields. The ground was like quicksand.

‘Look, if you injure yourself I don’t want to have to choose between helping you and getting to The Manor.’ It was the only way she could think of to get him to stay put.

His arguments dried up, but he hugged her so hard when she left that her bruised body could almost still feel it now. It gave her a small shred of comfort.

Now she was truly alone, as the rain battered down on an already sodden landscape. In the distance, a few pinpricks of light beckoned her home. A cold wind cut down from the silver birch wood. Autumn flew on its back. Maybe it only seemed that way because she was soaked through again, and exhausted. Back in the 4x4, she’d had to blink rapidly a few times to stop double vision.

A numbness that had nothing to do with the weather seeped into her bones. She knew instinctively that her brother was in as much trouble as Gabe.

‘Please God, make them be okay. Please.’ She whispered it over and over, only stopping to catch her breath as she made her way on all fours to the top of the slope. Olivia wasn’t religious, but she would gladly subscribe to any religion or god that would listen right now.

Finally the field levelled out and, mercifully, sloped slightly downhill to the boundary fence. Her legs turned to jelly as she tried to run and she fell awkwardly, winding herself. She stared up at the night sky. A single, cold-white star broke through the dense cloud. She shivered and dragged herself onto her feet. Her vision, now adjusted to the dark, could make out shadows of trees and the undulating field. The Manor brooded up in the distance like a nocturnal mirage. Dragging herself across the remainder of the field seemed to take hours.

Something pale caught her eye on a fence post. It fluttered in the tunnel of wind, snaking and dancing as though it was a living thing. She slid down the final few feet and caught it in her hand. It was soaked through but she recognised it—it was part of Beth’s shawl. Olivia chewed her bottom lip. This didn’t feel right either. Nothing felt right. But, held tight against her chest, the palm crosses reminded her that she was here for a reason.

An owl hooted in the distance, its voice haunting in the bleak dark. She craned her head towards the sound, towards the trail of silver birch stems. A flicker of movement behind one—a paleness that, when she blinked, became one with the tree. She rubbed her eyes with her sleeve. Get a grip, Olivia. Don’t start imagining things. She tried to make her inner voice stern, but it came out sounding more like Ella. A sob rose in her throat.

Everything hurt as she clambered over the fence and up the few worn steps to the fountain. She stumbled on the solid stones, half expecting her feet to sink right through them. She rested her weight against the edge of the fountain for a minute. Now that she was here, doubt flared up in her mind. What if Carver didn’t want to see her anymore? Olivia pictured herself suddenly appearing, covered in mud and producing the contents of her jacket. Surprise! A dead man told me to bring these...

The lawn yawned out in front of her, a perfect, dark oblong surrounded by a gravel pathway and bordered by trees. She knew it well in the friendly glow of daylight but now it seemed sinister and full of shadows. The nymph in the middle of the fountain regarded her with dead eyes.

A sudden crash from the direction of the house pulled her from her musings. The French doors lay open and a yellow light streamed onto the patio. Despite being at the end of the garden, she could see movement in that stream of light.

It turned her blood to ice.

Chapter Sixty-Seven

Gabe followed Ollie down the pitch-black hallway.

How could Ollie even see where he was going? The familiar layout was swallowed by the darkness as the lights cut out. Ollie had wasted no time in pulling him out of the kitchen.

‘Quick, come on. Remember I told you I knew a secret? Don’t let them hear.’

Gabe was all out of people keeping secrets—no good ever came from it. His life was a prime example. He was still smarting about Carver and Noah not telling him about the box. And then there was Moth, behaving as though he was the problem. Not to mention the elephant in the room that was Beth.

That last one he pushed behind the door in his mind marked ‘Mother-Son Relationship’. He learned long ago that allowing himself to think of her as a mother figure would only increase his guilt over the fact that she was protecting him all of those years ago. Her normal life brushed away as though she was a mark in the sand of time swept clean by the sea.

Gabe struggled with the knowledge that he ought to be feeling more, when in truth there was only a numbness he couldn’t explain.

A hand grabbed his arm as he tripped on the bottom stair and virtually hauled him upstairs. Ollie must really have something important to say. He wasn’t the kind of person to make a huge fuss over nothing and this change of heart was odd. But fuck it, everything was odd. Gabe decided to roll with whatever Ollie was going to tell him. At least he would have an ally.

He counted the steps as he went up, so he didn’t make a fool of himself again by second-guessing where the upper hallway was and falling flat on his face.

‘Shush.’ Ollie’s urgent whisper came out of the darkness.

Gabe stopped, his fingers resting on the handrail. He curled them around the wood. Ollie’s back was to him. Gabe listened, but all he could hear was the hammering of his own heartbeat in his ears. Gooseflesh crawled along his arms as his eyes finally became accustomed to the dark. Ollie was swaying from side to side, slowly. Gabe shrank back, his hip knocking the newel post. A spark of fear surged through his limbs, exploding out of his fingertips so hard that they tingled.

Ollie spun round and his arm snaked out, catching Gabe by the throat. His fingers were ice cold.

Gabe gasped, a strangulated sound that began and ended in his throat. He yanked at the vice-like grip, but it was like pulling against stone. Ollie raised his head. The opaque eyes looking right through him were the eyes of a dead man. A thin trickle of blood ran from one corner.

Gabe’s feet scrabbled for grip as he was hoisted from the ground. Ollie’s hold tightened. A low buzzing droned in Gabe’s ears and his vision hazed over. His legs kicked uselessly against empty space. Was this how it was going to end? Murdered by a man he thought of as a brother, and who had never hurt a fly in his life?

Gabe called for Clove in his head, screaming his name silently—his last hope.

There was the click of a door opening and Gabe’s world turned black. He spun like a top down into darkness.

Suddenly the grip around his throat slackened. He fell hard against the handrail, his spine taking the full impact of his body weight. Every nerve ending fired, sending distress signals to his brain as he crumpled into a coughing heap on the floor. Tears streamed down his face but all he could do was gulp down mouthfuls of air.

The sound of feet running echoed in the hallway below, but it seemed very far off, as though he was in a vast underground cave. His chest was on fire. Every intake of breath was painful, but he’d endure any pain—he was alive. Slowly, his vision cleared and he hauled himself up onto his knees.

The lights flickered rapidly, then stayed on.

Right outside his bedroom door, Ollie laid still, his eyes staring up at the ceiling. Astride him was Moth, his eyes burning with an intensity that made Gabe shrink back. Moth’s face was smeared in blood, his worn shirt saturated with it. A slow smile spread across his face as he saw Gabe, a half grin, which showed two small, razor-sharp fangs.

Ollie’s throat was gnawed open.

Everything became a blur of raised voices, accusations. Gabe closed his eyes. If he couldn’t see, he didn’t have to accept what his brain was processing.

Muted colours flared behind his eyelids as he was carried downstairs. His face pressed tight against a hard chest and the smell of earth prickling his nostrils. Clove. He relaxed against him, too exhausted to fight with anything anymore. Where was Ollie? But he knew the answer to that. Guilt welled up in his mouth and the cry that came out was the anguished sound of human loss. It burned in his throat. Clove held him tight and whispered words Gabe didn’t understand against his hair.

Carver’s voice was near, his familiar hand on Gabe’s shoulder. Angry words spun past his ears and he tried to block them out. So much emotional pain today. He was wracked with it, beaten down to a few thin fibres of himself.

‘You can’t take him. I won’t let you.’

‘And how do you propose to stop me?’

‘Your so-called protection hasn’t faired well, so far.’

And then Moth’s voice, drifting in from the periphery as Clove’s arms lowered him onto the couch. ‘I saved his fucking miserable life. Don’t go blaming me for doing what I had to.’

‘Stop it. Please.’ There was no authority in his voice, but everyone stopped dead in their tracks, even Clove who stood over Gabe like the darkest of guardian angels. Teal timidly appeared from the shadow of the doorway and stopped by Moth’s side. ‘You’re playing right into its hands again. Your unity is the one thing it fears the most.’

Gabe watched through half-focused eyes as Moth regarded Teal as though he was seeing him for the first time.

Carver thrust his hands into his jacket pockets. He was dwarfed not only by Clove’s height and presence, but by a grief not yet let out of its cage. It hung over him, stooping his shoulders and twisting itself into the lines of his face.

If he cries, we will all fall apart, Gabe thought. Suddenly he was cold and trembling. ‘Where’s Noah?’ He couldn’t see him and the lead weight of dread dropped in his stomach.

‘I’m here, don’t worry.’ Noah came from the kitchen drying his hands on a towel. His face was pinched and drawn and there was blood on his sleeves and down the front of his jeans.

Ollie’s blood.

Gabe stuffed his fist into his mouth and bit down onto his finger.

‘What the hell happened up there, Gabe?’ Carver’s voice, laced with sorrow.

Gabe wanted nothing more than to forget the last half an hour, but that wasn’t an option. Not now. Not ever.

Moth’s eyes drilled into his skull from behind.

‘It wasn’t Ollie. Something...something was inside him.’ Gabe faltered. Ollie was carrying a secret. He didn’t want to mention that.

‘It’s okay, Gabe. Take your time.’ Noah sat by his side.

‘He was acting weird but I didn’t notice until we were upstairs. Then he attacked me...but it wasn’t him. There was nothing of Ollie left’

The skittering started again—a nerve-shredding, rapid scratching, like a knife scraping against a bottle. But this time, it was coming from inside the walls.

Chapter Sixty-Eight

Olivia rested her forehead against the cold, damp stone of the fountain. Her chest hurt. Fuck it. Everything hurt. But now that she was here, with only a manicured oblong of lawn to cross over, she was scared. She clasped her hand over her jacket. The palm crosses lay right over her heart.

That movement she noticed on the patio? Insects. Hundreds of them. She tried to be the old Olivia, the one who would pick up a spider and toss it out of the door nonchalantly as Ollie freaked out. A little bit of logic waved its hand. Maybe the storm had unearthed a huge nest of them underground, washed them out, and they were valiantly trying to get home. Just like her. She took a deep breath and headed off towards the house.

She walked with her head down until she reached the first stones, with the hopeful assumption that if she didn’t see them, she couldn’t be scared—but they were gone, as if they never existed. She blinked hard, and then a surge of relief crash-landed into her shoes and made her legs feel boneless. The golden light of The White Room welcomed her home.

She stopped dead. The room stood empty, but signs of life dotted its surface—a squashed cushion, a book laying open on the chair by the hearth, a half-drunk cup of coffee on the low table.

‘Hello?’ It sounded so stupid to be saying that simple word when she was entering her own home. And this place was home. If she ever doubted it, the events of the day had beaten it into her stubborn mind.

The house shimmered with something undefinable. It hung in the air, like walking through an ancient building where shadows of the people who lived and died there still dwelt in the surviving stones. The Manor was old, but it had never felt old. She turned slowly and gazed out into the darkness.

Something swirled against the low brick wall that formed the start of the rose border. It moved slowly, fluidly. She sniffed the air. Smoke. But surely it was too wet for any kind of fire? There was that logic again, but today had shown her that logic was screwed.

The pull of it drew her away from the lit threshold. The smoke seemed to be curling up over the wall, meandering its way towards the overhang where the old outhouses stood. She winced as her feet crunched on the gravel.

Her eyes grew accustomed to the lack of light again as she tried to follow the trail on its journey. She thought Ollie’s voice whispered to her from its depths, but that was impossible. It suddenly turned and dropped onto the pathway, before disappearing under the door of the nearest outhouse. It was the old coal house, the one that led to the chute into the cellar, now used for storing the gardener’s tools.

Olivia reached the door and stretched out her hand. It would be locked. The gardener always kept it locked. He was the epitome of careful. She depressed the latch and it opened with a soft click.

It was hard to keep her thoughts in gear. She was so tired and part of her brain struggled with something that seemed to be important, but she couldn’t quite grasp it. The interior of the coal house smelled dank and dusty. She couldn’t remember where the light switch was. And that thought kept battling against the fog in her head. The dark unfurled out in front of her, deeper than the night.

A sound echoed up from the depths of the chute—a half laugh that held no humour, only a crazy kind of madness.

Adrenaline coursed through her veins and she scrambled backwards, but the door that had opened so easily was now solid against her back. The smoke filled her nostrils and she spluttered, her hand instinctively flying to her mouth.

The thought that had been battling against her conscience like a moth against light screamed through her brain.

Smoke could never lead you.

Pressure began behind her shoulders, as though the door was pushing her forward. She dug in her heels and grabbed for anything in the pitch black. Her hand hit a shelf and she grabbed for it, but missed. The pressure moved her physically. Something was behind her, but there was nothing to see. A startled sob rose in her throat and her heart rate spiked.

The manic laugh cackled again and this time, she thought there was the slow grinding of teeth.

Her feet caught on the ledge of the coal chute and her arms flailed into nothingness. Then, the pressure hit her right between the shoulder blades and she fell into the jaws of what waited below.

***

Clove knew something the others didn’t.

Olivia’s struggle with the demon played along the wires of his instincts, twinging the fragile threads, making them sing. But she was of no interest. A small part of his mind appreciated its persistence, but if the other humans died, it was hardly a setback. Clove’s only interest lay in Gabriel. And the demon would not win that battle.

He watched the occupants of the room using every one of his keen senses. It might look as if he was in conversation or thought, but that was merely a front.

The skittering noise was not constant. It vanished for a few minutes at a time then reappeared in only one wall or under the floor, mangling the already-shredded nerves of the humans. The demon toyed with them as a cat with a bird, with cruelty, with no compassion. Even Teal looked unsure and had glued himself to Moth’s side. When they were alone, he would get the full story of what happened upstairs, but he was sure Gabriel had spoken the truth. Clove reprimanded himself for not being there. Assuming that Ollie wasn’t a threat was unforgivable. The incident happened quickly, and he had been too busy mentally wrangling the demon when the lights went out. Underestimating his opponent could prove fatal. He wasn’t about to make any more mistakes.

Noah stood, then bent to place his hand over Gabriel’s brow. Clove pursed his lips. A prayer. Interesting. The priest had seemed to be all out of faith a little while ago.

Clove intercepted Noah with a questioning look as Noah made for the door.

‘I’m going to pray for Ollie. I won’t leave him up there alone and I won’t let anything else happen to him. Don’t follow me. I want to be alone with him.’ There was a waver in his voice despite the brave words.

Clove stepped aside and gestured with his arm to the kitchen. If Noah wanted to risk his own life for that of a dead man, so be it. At the start of the night, Clove had thought he could keep them all safe. Now he was all out of chief protector mode.

‘I fear your God has deserted you. Or do you think he is watching from the sidelines?’

Noah’s lips tightened into a thin line. ‘My God is testing me. And my God is your God too.’

‘We must have a theological discussion one day. I think I may be able to sway your mind.’

Noah’s shadow paused in the hallway. Clove waited for a reply, but it seemed Noah had no answer for that.

Chapter Sixty-Nine

Noah made the decision to go to Ollie the moment he was sure Gabe was okay. He could feel the cold chill of shock settling around his shoulders. It was obvious Ollie had passed the point where medical intervention could help.

The full horror of the event hadn’t yet sunk in, but it hung over his head like a boulder tottering on the edge of a cliff. No one had really reacted, apart from Gabe. He wondered how much more he could take and how changed he would be after this night ended. How changed they all would be.

Noah trudged up the stairs. They seemed to go on forever. Ollie lay where he had fallen, in a dark pool of blood, one arm dangling over the top step. Noah didn’t want to look at the wound where his throat once was, but he knew that he had to. It glistened with congealed blood, the raw tissue wet and obscenely pink in the glow of the lamp. His glasses lay twisted on the carpet, his eyes open, staring blankly at the ceiling.

If the demon wanted to attack Noah now, he knew he would be an easy target. The brand on his forehead throbbed with each movement of his brow, a constant reminder of the power the demon possessed. God hadn’t come to save him. Maybe He knew Noah’s faith was wavering. As he grabbed a blanket from the nearest bedroom, he came to the conclusion that, while he might be a lousy priest, he wouldn’t be a lousy friend. Ollie would be treated with the dignity he deserved.

He knelt down and the blood oozed into the knees of his jeans. He retched and gulped several mouthfuls of air to force it down. With a quivering hand, he closed Ollie’s eyelids for the last time. He recited the Lord’s Prayer, but every time he got to the line ‘but deliver us from evil’, resentment flared and the words stuck.

Ollie was never overtly religious, but he wasn’t a disbeliever. ‘I’m hedging my bets,’ he’d said with that boyish grin. Noah could hear his voice in his head. Did he ever hedge his bets that something evil would kill him? Noah fought his anger as he covered Ollie’s body with the blanket. It had been easy for the demon to infiltrate Ollie’s body, to drive out the goodness and the energy that defined him. Noah knew that power too; Gabe didn’t stand a chance. Their only hope was with the vampires, and if that wasn’t a kick in the teeth then nothing was. Did Clove have the understanding to battle it and win? He had to believe that. The irony of it wasn’t lost to him.

Carefully, he scooped up Ollie’s lifeless body, hefting him to his chest and carrying him down the stairs. He was heavier than Noah had expected. The phrase ‘dead weight’ hammered against his skull like some macabre woodpecker.

It would be too much to take Ollie into the room where the others were, but Noah didn’t want to leave him alone with the chance that the demon would try to desecrate his body. That only left one place where he would be safe—the place where all this started early this morning.

***

The White Room became a stage, or at least that’s what Gabe thought as he eased himself onto his feet. It was as if each scene was being played out, and occasionally the actors exited stage left. A surreal sense of passing time hung in the air.

Carver sat with Teal at the end of the room, both of them nose-deep in manuscripts. Occasionally, one of them would bring a point to the attention of the other and there would be nodding or the shaking of a head. It was like the old days before any of this had happened, before Gabe decided to go poking his nose into things he should have left well alone. Before the box. Before Beth. Before Ollie.

Gabe winced as he straightened up. Clove sat by the window, turning the box around in his hands, his long black hair obscuring his face.

Gabe cleared his throat, not because he wanted to announce his approach—Clove would have known that seconds before—but because his airways were shrivelled and bruised.

‘Gabriel.’ Clove tucked his hair behind one ear as he glanced up. ‘It appears you have as many lives as a cat. That is, I think, a good thing.’

For a moment, Gabe thought he saw the shadow of a sad smile, something a little wistful.

‘I can’t wait around anymore. The people I love are dying because of me.’ The words stuck in his throat, a burning ember that lodged there and refused to budge.

‘I know. I understand. I hoped it would show itself by now, but I am concerned that it is waiting until dawn.’

Gabe’s mouth opened slightly and then the penny dropped. ‘Oh, fuck. I hadn’t thought of that.’

‘I keep thinking that I’m missing something with this.’ Clove gestured to the box. ‘Here, in the inner lip of the lid—there are marks, see?’

Gabe narrowed his eyes and held the box up to the light. It was the first time he had inspected the object that had played such a great part in his family’s downfall. The wood felt rotten in his hand, like a coffin dug up from a worm-ridden grave.

‘Is it a language?’ Gabe paused. He was going to say that Ollie had a knack of deciphering ancient languages.

‘I don’t think so. More of a signature, I believe.’ Clove clasped his shoulder and Gabe didn’t pull away. He wasn’t scared anymore. Not of Clove. The vampire was turning out to be something solid he could rely on.

Gabe stared at the inside of the box. It was hard, even now, to understand how his whole life had been shaped by it. He ran his finger over a dark stain on the bottom. ‘Is this what I think it is?’

Clove nodded and brushed his fingers along Gabe’s wrist as he took charge, placing the box on the table. Gabe cradled his wrist with his other hand. He could still feel the pressure.

‘Where is Noah, anyway?’

‘He went to clear up the mess upstairs.’ Moth’s voice cut into their conversation. He was stood as far away from everyone as he could get, flicking a pack of playing cards through his fingers.

An almost physical pain stabbed through Gabe’s chest. He couldn’t hide the hurt in his face.

Any further remarks from Moth were cut off by a single glance from Clove, but the younger vampire’s animosity sizzled in the air.

The skittering started again. This time, it was coming from inside the chimney breast. A flurry of soot fell into the hearth. Everyone turned to watch it settle.

A few thin tendrils of smoke trailed out over the hearth and Clove pulled Gabe against him.

Chapter Seventy

Olivia opened her eyes to darkness.

Panic scoured her veins, dragging thorns of terror in its wake. But inside her jacket, the palm crosses prickled through the thin cotton of her shirt. It was a small shred of comfort and she clung to it. The force that had pushed her down the coal chute was gone, but she wasn’t stupid enough to think it had gone for good. Something hadn’t wanted her to get back to the Manor House, and now that she’d made it, she wasn’t giving up despite every muscle and bone in her body screaming at her to stop. She eased herself onto her knees and spat out a mouthful of coal dust. Her eyes stung with it and she could feel it on the palms of her hands and her face. Dust again.

Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.

‘Fuck it!’

The noise echoed around the confined space, mocking her from all angles. She crawled towards the wall that separated the two cellars and used it as leverage to ease herself upright. Peering through the brick air holes, a faint wedge of light from under the door at the top of the jam cellar stairs taunted her. So close, so far away.

Her right ankle throbbed. On closer inspection, it was hot and swollen but nothing was broken, which had to be a minor miracle.

Up ahead, the keypad of the vault glowed. It was her sole object of focus as she gritted her teeth and forced herself to her feet.

‘You know it would have been easier to use the door.’ The familiar voice drifted down from the top of the stairs. The dust coating her tongue turned to relief.

‘I could use a bit of help here, damn you.’ She didn’t care that her words wobbled. All she wanted was to get upstairs, away from the oppressive darkness. Part of her never wanted to leave the safety of The Manor again.

***

Oh, this was the most delicious of nights! Aka Maga drifted fragments of itself into the room. It lapped up their fear. It had planned to wait until dawn, but its new born heartbeat and vitality had increased its sense of power; it did not have to wait any longer. Let the vampires cower down before it, too. Even the old one would be no match.

Gabriel stood with Clove’s arms protectively around him, nearly as pale-skinned as the vampire. Dark shadows pooled under his eyes. Bruises already dappled his neck from Ollie’s attack. Aka Maga was somehow glad that attempt to take Gabriel had failed. It wanted them all to be a party to the moment where it suffocated the life from the boy and replaced it with its own superior spirit.

Aka Maga decided Moth would be Gabriel’s first victim. Even though it was glad Ollie’s attack was unsuccessful, the meddling young vampire would pay for his audacity. Dawn was approaching. It would see him burn.

It floated into the room and raised itself into the dense, rolling pillar that so many had cowed down before. Its heartbeat thudded, strong and exultant, unconquerable at long last. The ball of black energy within its core whirled to life like a chainsaw blade, all of the pain and indignity concentrated into a mass of hate and triumph. It found a language in its stored memory they would all understand.

‘It has been an interesting game, but I tire of play. I could have taken him at any time.’ A hollow laugh echoed from within it as Gabriel shrank back. ‘I could have destroyed you all, with a flick of my wrist. Even you, night walker.

‘It would have been so much easier for all concerned if you hadn’t intervened, Noah Isaacs. If only your faith had been as weak then as it is now. Gabriel is mine—has always been mine. I will gift him with the kind of immortality that history will bow down before.’

‘Do not flatter yourself, demon.’ Clove’s voice carried not a hint of fear and it admired his courage, begrudgingly.

‘Shall I kill your children first? To make a point? That one there would make a fine entree.’ Moth stood by Clove’s side. Aka Maga could smell the fear on him despite his firm stance. ‘I see your other child has fled the room. No matter. I will cut him down before the dawn breaks.’

It watched for any sign of emotion from Clove but found none. That was an irritation; they should all fear for their lives.

On all four walls, the paint began to blister and peel like shreds of skin as its dark energy boiled. A few degrees away from total crazed insanity.

Finally, the sand had run out of the hourglass for Gabriel Davenport.

It set the spinning ball of its core into motion and felt the ice-cold centre shift into a mass of razor-edged shards. The tendrils of smoke curled against the boy’s limbs.

Gabriel screamed—a lovely, plaintive wail filled with horror and anguish. It was the sweetest sound Aka Maga had ever heard.

Chapter Seventy-One

So this was the moment he would die.

Gabe remembered all the movies where the young hero miraculously discovers his superpower to battle the forces of evil and triumph. No one had given him that script.

Clove’s arms held him tightly and he was even grateful for Moth’s hovering presence.

There was only one card left to play, the one he was praying he didn’t have to use.

‘End it for me,’ he whispered to Clove. “Please. Do it so it can’t take me.’

An instant later, a curtain of hair fell over Gabe’s face as the vampire lowered his head.

A man shouted, but Gabe couldn’t tell if it was Noah or Carver. Gabe was too intent on breathing. In his peripheral vision, he could see that the ball of black energy was almost upon them.

The cold touch of Clove’s lips sent a shiver down his spine.

The glass in the French doors shattered. Through strands of Clove’s hair, he saw Noah duck. A pale form emerged, as thin and willowy as a sapling silver birch. Splinters of glass dusted her hair with diamonds and blood ran from the corner of her mouth in a thin trail.

Her dark eyes shone with a barely-concealed madness. Gabe took one moment to register who it was, before she launched herself into the small space that separated him from the energy force.

In that instant, Clove swept him to one side and Moth’s hands were yanking him towards the door. He struggled, his eyes fixed to the place where he had been only seconds before.

The black ball hit Beth full in the chest. She staggered, absorbing it with a howl that struck Gabe’s heart like a sucker punch. The evil that was Aka Maga tore open her heart, her blood turning black beneath translucent skin as it raced through her veins.

‘Do something!’ Gabe spat the words out into the mayhem.

‘Leave her. She won’t last the night—she’s a renegade.’ Moth pulled him away but hesitated, both of them magnetically drawn back to what was happening.

Teal stood in the doorway with Olivia at his side. She was clutching something in her hands.

It was all a frenetic blur of movement and voices.

Noah took what Olivia was offering. She clutched them like flowers.

But Gabe’s eyes couldn’t stop watching the horror unfolding in the centre of the room.

A wail rose from Beth’s throat, an inhuman sound that made the blood in Gabe’s veins turn to ice. Plumes of smoke spiralled out of her mouth as her head fell back. She clawed at her own throat.

Clove’s attention seemed to be on the box sitting on the table, Beth’s struggle only a minor distraction. Gabe wanted to launch himself at Clove, make him do something, anything, but Moth held him firm.

Something crawled over Gabe’s foot and he looked down—thousands of cockroaches writhed over the patio, turning it to a black, moving carpet and he froze. Moth hesitated and Gabe took this as his only chance. He twisted his arm and snatched it back against his body. Moth’s grip loosened for a moment.

Gabe bolted for the doorway, the crunch of insect bodies beneath his feet.

Carver screamed for him to stop.

‘Pray, Noah! Something from the Foot of the Cross!’ Clove held the box open in his hands.

A blinding white light erupted from Beth’s mouth, obliterating the smoke for a few seconds. Gabe crossed his arms over his face, temporarily blinded. Something hit him in the chest. It sliced through his flesh and bone as though he was made of paper. Blood welled up in his mouth. He doubled over, pain alive in every nerve ending. He needed to breathe but had forgotten how.

Someone caught Gabe under the arms before he hit the floor. The room blurred and spun. He reached out, the thick blood spilling from his mouth. He was drowning in it. Blindness settled but he could still hear the shrill, panicked voices around him.

Fingers touched his skin. His head was being gently cradled, but the pain twisted all reality into a tight, hard knot that he followed in his mind’s eye. The knot floated upwards, as if being carried by water—or blood.

He felt himself being lifted, held tightly. The smell of damp earth. Clove.

Gabe knew he was dying. Life wasn’t like a book. The kid didn’t get to save the world. He didn’t even get to save his family or friends. He did the best he could, but it wasn’t enough.

His limbs were cold. He couldn’t feel his fingers or his toes and he was tired, so tired. His eyelids fluttered. Clove’s pale face was silhouetted against an ink-black sky. Gabe forced his mouth into what he hoped was a smile. We tried. We really tried.

Clove lowered his head and pressed a kiss to Gabe’s brow.

Gabe closed his eyes as one more knife of pain sliced through his body. Maybe death was a small price to pay.

Chapter Seventy-Two

Aka Maga seethed in the crypt upon the hill. The stench of the nightborn filled its nostrils.

It was so close to claiming Gabriel, too close perhaps. It scourged itself with its mistakes, lashing itself with barbs of regret. It had not anticipated Beth’s appearance. It left her for dead on the hill, weak and pitiful. And it had not planned for her to turn into a renegade. It knew about the existence of such half-breeds, but they rarely lasted more than a few hours and were always dead by dawn.

It had underestimated her love for her son, which had somehow surfaced from its cloistered cell within her brain.

It wanted to make her suffer and it did, driving out the last remnants of her goodness in the blinding flash of light. It had shredded her soul in front of the priest. And the boy would have been next. It had ploughed a shard of itself into his fragile flesh to pin him down. That’s when it saw Clove holding the box. Inside it, it knew, lay the one thing that could quiet it.

Its energy seeped away as Noah recited the prayer. It remembered the general—the man who had cursed it, and his deranged sorcerer. It remembered the man they called the Son of God. Religion hung on that cross and religion had showed it no mercy on the killing tree.

Aka Maga knew it did not have the capability to claim Gabriel in a weakened state. So it had done the only thing that it could: it stayed within Beth.

Whilst the vampire saliva ran through her veins, it infused her spinal column with its own life force and obliterated her memories one by one, chewing through every cell that made her human. It was a sweet and brutal surrender.

Now, Aka Maga lived for the first time in female form. Thwarted, but resilient. Inside her body, new cells formed, borne from the marriage of vampire and demon. It felt strangely renewing.

She licked her mental wounds and brooded. The boy might be dead, but she was far from cowed. The vampires had started a war with their meddling. She would rest and adjust to her new form and power, honing them like a knife blade. Then, she would seek them out and destroy them…one by one.

This wasn’t an end. It was a beginning.

Chapter Seventy-Three

Dawn arrived, draped in shades of pink and gold. She was dressed for the day that nobody in The Manor wanted an invite for.

They were beyond exhaustion. But nobody slept.

Fingers of light and grace replaced the darkness and mayhem. The grandfather clock continued to chime, as though just another ordinary dawn was breaking.

Their losses were too much to comprehend. Beth. Ollie. Gabe. In one night, they had been left bereft. They were too broken to gather all the pieces.

Olivia climbed onto a bar stool in the kitchen. She was wearing one of Ollie’s Uni sweatshirts, the sleeves pulled up to her elbows. Bruises dappled her skin.

‘I saw him, Noah. He was at the top of the stairs by the vault. He helped me to climb them. Don’t you think I would know my own brother?’ Olivia stirred a spoon around in her coffee mug, as though looking for an answer in the depths.

Carver sat opposite with Noah by his side. Sunlight poured in through the kitchen window and warmed their backs. Noah reached across the kitchen counter and clasped her hand. The skin on the insides of his wrists was scratched and raw. He wondered how he could offer comfort when he, too, was in need.

‘He was helping you, one last time.’

Carver nodded slowly. ‘You see ghosts, Olivia. Ollie wouldn’t have gone forward without knowing you were okay. He was desperately worried about you.’

Olivia’s skinned knuckles curled around her mug. Her throat ached with constricted tears. ‘Why did you let Clove take Gabe?’

‘I couldn’t stop him.’ Carver’s voice throbbed with the loss they all understood. ‘And I didn’t want Gabe’s last breath to be under this roof. I wanted him to be free. I only kept him here last night because I thought it was the safest place for him. It’s all my fault.’

‘For what it’s worth, I don’t thinking running would have saved him, either.’ Noah slid the brandy bottle across the counter but Carver shook his head.

No one mentioned what was on all of their minds: What did Clove do with Gabe’s body?

‘Did it kill Beth?’ Olivia wiped her eyes on the sleeve of the sweatshirt.

Noah hesitated. ‘I don’t know for certain. The light blinded me, blinded us all.’ He didn’t mention he’d had the horrible sensation that it had taken her soul. ‘By the time I’d regained my sight, Beth was gone and Gabe was on the floor...’ His voice trailed off.

The box lay between them, filled with the palm crosses. Olivia ran her finger down the jagged edge of a reed. ‘I still don’t understand how these worked.’

Noah could hardly bear to look at them. ‘They symbolise goodness and victory.’ He shrugged. God hadn’t saved Beth, or Ollie. Or Gabe. Noah’s faith lay in tatters.

Carver cleared his throat. The words were stuck. ‘If everyone agrees, we’ll keep this close. We’ll cover it up the best we can, because how would we explain it all otherwise?’

It seemed too soon to be talking about reality, but Noah knew the decision was wise. The rules of law did not apply in this half-world they’d inhabited.

‘My family has a corner plot in St. Jude’s. We can lay Ollie to rest there.’ Words. Just words.

For the first time, Noah understood what his parishioners felt when he offered them sympathy.

If my faith was stronger, could I have saved him? Guilt ravaged the dark corners of his mind.

Olivia crossed her arms on the counter and put her head down. Her shoulders shook.

Nothing would ever be the same.

***

As dusk fell that same day, Clove and his fledglings rose from their death sleep under the dusty rafters of the vicarage of St. Jude’s. They had taken refuge behind a stack of old tea chests in the eaves of the roof, amidst nearly a century of things that owners, all long dead, had once thought useful.

They had barely made it before the first slivers of dawn brightened the fields, Clove carrying Gabe’s still body and Moth hauling Teal, his arm around the weaker vampire’s waist.

Returning to the crypt wasn’t an option. It was too close to the house, and compromised. Clove knew that things were far from over. In fact, they had just begun. What he had seen as a small distraction and the need to vanquish an evil that even he found abhorrent, had turned into the beginnings of a much deadlier battle. He had made mistakes. He had been too long without the need to use wit and wile before strength.

Gabriel’s plea for death had stirred feelings within him he had once thought long gone. His noble words were uttered only a fraction of a second before Clove was about to deliver death. He had told Gabriel he would not let the demon claim him. And he always kept his promises.

Neither Moth nor Teal had spoken much—the effects of the coming dawn made anything but movement difficult. He had treated them too kindly in the past, always making sure they were in the dark before the first light crept over the horizon. That would have to change. Moth would be fine—he would sulk and rebel, but he would come through. Teal was another story. His blood was weak. And Moth without Teal might become something unstable.

Moth stared out of the window onto the dark mass of the graveyard below. A single lit window from the church cast a square of light onto an old tomb covered in lichen. It sat at a tilt, uprooted slightly by the large yew close by. It looked like the dead were indeed trying to rise.

‘We should have killed them.’ Moth turned, one side of his face ghostlike in the moonlight. ‘They know about us now. It’s not safe.’

Clove remembered a time when he would have said the same thing. ‘They are scientists of the occult. To destroy us would be to destroy everything they believe in. They have more on their minds right now than searching for us. Great loss will weigh them down.’

Moth shrugged. Teal stole up behind him and laid his head against Moth’s shoulder.

‘Are you hunting for us tonight? Teal needs it.’

Always on the lookout for his weaker sibling. That part of Moth’s humanity still clung to him.

‘I will soon,’ Clove answered, his hand resting on a curled bundle on the floor. ‘And tonight, you come with me. You need to be able to fend for yourselves.’

Teal’s bright blue-green eyes widened slightly.

‘It will be different now—I knew it would,’ said Moth.

The bundle stirred and slowly uncurled.

Clove waited as the moonlight streamed its silver threads onto the bare wooden floor. He held out his wrist.

Gabriel Davenport opened his vampire eyes and smiled.

About the Author

Beverley Lee is a freelance writer currently residing in the south east of England. In thrall to the written word from an early age, especially the darker side of fiction, she believes that the very best story is the one you have to tell. Supporting fellow authors is also her passion and she is actively involved in social media writers’ groups. The Making of Gabriel Davenport is her debut novel.

Acknowledgements

There are a number of people, without whom, this book wouldn’t have seen the light of day. My grateful thanks to my wonderful editor, Kate Angelella, who went above and beyond the call of duty and curbed my enthusiasm for over explaining. To Mia Maxwell, my talented cover illustrator (love you, peapal) and to Lorraine Richer for my beautiful cover design. My beta readers who got an early draft of this and waded through with comments and support – Matt Rydeen, Holly Clark, Martin McConnell, Mia Maxwell, Chiquandra Cross. To Adam Lee, who answered my questions on things vehicle and technology related.

Thank you to my friends and supporters on Twitter and the #bookstagram community on Instagram, for showing me the human side of social media. You know who you are.

And to you, for choosing this book.